Testing the Transfer of the Online /I/-/[Near-close near-front unrounded vowel]/ Training Effect in Korean L2 Learners of English: From Speech Perception to Spoken Word Recognition

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Autor/in	Lee, Jinmyung
Titel	Testing the Transfer of the Online /I/-/[Near-close near-front unrounded vowel]/ Training Effect in Korean L2 Learners of English: From Speech Perception to Spoken Word Recognition
Quelle	(2022), (138 Seiten) PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Kansas
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Monographie
ISBN	979-8-3684-8007-7
Schlagwörter	Hochschulschrift; Dissertation; Second Language Learning; Second Language Instruction; Phonetics; Auditory Perception; English (Second Language); Korean; Vowels; Cognitive Ability; Language Proficiency; Oral Language; Word Recognition; Cues; Transfer of Training + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Thesis; Dissertations; Academic thesis; Zweitsprachenerwerb; Fremdsprachenunterricht; Phonetik; Fonetik; Auditive Wahrnehmung; Akustische Wahrnehmung; Akustik; English as second language; English; Second Language; Englisch als Zweitsprache; Koreanisch; Denkfähigkeit; Language skill; Language skills; Sprachkompetenz; Oral interpretation; Mündlicher Sprachgebrauch; Worterkennung; Stichwort; Training; Transfer; Ausbildung
Abstract	Second language (L2) learners often have difficulty perceiving L2 sound contrasts when the first-language (L1) and L2 sounds are acoustically similar and these similar L2 sounds correspond to an existing L1 sound (Flege, 1995). To improve L2 learners' perception of sound contrasts, researchers have used high-variability phonetic training (HVPT) that helps L2 learners ignore irrelevant variability for perceiving the sound contrast, and as a result, focus only on the relevant acoustic and articulatory properties of the sounds (Barriuso & Hayes-Harb, 2018). The present study investigated whether training Korean L2 learners of English with HVPT on the /i/-/[Near-close near-front unrounded vowel]/ contrast in English would improve their use of spectral cues and duration cues not only in the identification of words that contain /i/ or /[Near-close near-front unrounded vowel]/ ("outcome" of spoken word recognition) but also in the activation of such words ("processes" of spoken word recognition). In addition, the present study examined whether Korean L2 learners of English could generalize their use of acoustic cues to talkers and words not heard in the training, and it investigated whether (and if so, how) cognitive abilities such as attention control and inhibition control, as well as English proficiency, are related to performance in the pre-test and/or training gains. During the online training, Korean listeners in the experimental group (who were trained on the /i/-/[Near-close near-front unrounded vowel]/ contrast) significantly increased their accuracy on the /i/-/[Near-close near-front unrounded vowel]/ contrast in the two-alternative forced-choice identification task, showing their progress from their first training session (session 1) to the last training session (session 8). Hence, the training was found to enhance Korean listeners' identification of words (outcome of spoken word recognition). Korean listeners in the experimental group significantly enhanced their use of both spectral cues and duration cues in the two-alternative forced-choice identification task from the pre-test to the post-test while Korean listeners in the control group (who received the training on the /[Voiced alveolar and postalveolar approximants]/-/l/ contrast) did not. Furthermore, in the post-test, Korean listeners in the experimental group were able to generalize their improved identification to new words but not to the new talker. However, there was no significant relationship between the experimental group's cognitive abilities and their pre-test accuracy and/or training gains, and no significant relationship between the experimental group's English proficiency and their pre-test accuracy and/or training gains. For Korean listeners' spoken word recognition, the training was found to be less helpful. Korean listeners in either the experimental group or the control group did not show facilitative priming effects for semantically related primes and targets in either the pre-test or the post-test, and they did not significantly enhance their use of spectral cues and duration cues for either /i/-targets (targets semantically related to /i/-words) or /[Near-close near-front unrounded vowel]/-targets (targets semantically related to /[Near-close near-front unrounded vowel]/-words) in the cross-modal semantic priming task, although the use of duration cues for both targets became numerically stronger for Korean listeners in the experimental group (post-test). Korean listeners only showed a significantly smaller priming effect in the post-test compared to the pre-test for /[Near-close near-front unrounded vowel]/-targets across spectral cues, duration cues, and groups. Korean listeners in the experimental group were able to generalize their decreased priming effects in the spectral cue mismatch conditions to new words for /i/-targets and to new words and a new talker for /[Near-close near-front unrounded vowel]/-targets in the post-test, but these results can hardly be interpreted as generalization given the lack of improvement of the use of spectral or duration cues based on the priming results. There was no significant relationship between the experimental group's cognitive abilities and their pre-test priming effect in the spectral cue mismatch conditions and/or training gains, and no significant relationship between the experimental group's English proficiency and their pre-test priming effect in the spectral cue mismatch conditions and/or training gains. These results should be interpreted with caution, considering that native English listeners also did not show facilitative priming effects for semantically related primes and targets, and their significant reliance on spectral cues was only observed for /i/-targets in the cross-modal semantic priming task, although their reliance on spectral cues for /[Near-close near-front unrounded vowel]/-targets was numerically in the right direction. Taken together, this study provides supporting evidence for the effectiveness of online HVPT for L2 learners to improve and generalize their identification of words containing difficult sound contrasts in the L2. Further research should explore whether the effects of training on a single phonological context and a single sound contrast could be extended to new phonological contexts and new sound contrasts, respectively. Finally, online HVPT could be implemented outside of L2 classrooms to help L2 learners' phonological learning at their own pace. 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Update	2024/1/01