ERIC Number: EJ1353238
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2022
Pages: 12
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1916-4742
EISSN: EISSN-1916-4750
Available Date: N/A
Discrimination of L2 British English Monophthong Contrasts: The Case of L2 Thai Learners of English
Kitikanan, Patchanok
English Language Teaching, v15 n7 p1-12 2022
This article reports on the second language (L2) perception of contrasts among British English monophthongs. This study has two aims: 1) to explore the discriminability of contrasts in L2 British English monophthongs; and 2) to test the perceptual assimilation model-L2 (PAM-L2) towards the ability to discriminate British English contrasts. The contrasts considered were: /i?/-/[near-close near-front unrounded vowel]/, /ae/-[open-mid back unrounded vowel]/, /[ezh]?/-/[open-mid back unrounded vowel]/, /u?/-/[near-close back rounded vowel]/, /e/-/ae/, /[open-mid back unrounded vowel]/-/[open back rounded vowel]/, /[near-close back rounded vowel] /-/[open-mid back rounded vowel]?/, /[open back unrounded vowel]?/-/[open-mid back unrounded vowel]/, /[esh]?/-/[open-mid back rounded vowel]?/. Fifty-two native speakers of Thai who were learning English as a foreign language in Thailand participated in a forced-choice ABX discrimination task. The participants were divided between two groups -- those high-experienced and those low-experienced. The results evidence how both groups performed well on most contrasts (over 80% correct), except for /[open-mid back unrounded vowel]/-/[open back rounded vowel]/. Although the discriminability of the contrast /[open-mid back unrounded vowel]/-/[open back rounded vowel]/ was lower than with the other contrasts, the discrimination scores among both groups remained in a middle range (over 70%). No effect of L2 experience was found, thus suggesting that the abilities of both groups did not differ. The PAM-L2 was accurate in predicting that neither group of L2 Thai learners would have difficulty in discriminating the considered L2 sound contrasts. These results imply that the results gained from a perceptual assimilation task are useful in predicting the discriminability of L2 sound contrasts, as suggested by the PAM-L2.
Descriptors: Language Variation, Vowels, Second Language Learning, English (Second Language), Auditory Discrimination, Phonemes, Thai, Native Language, Second Language Instruction, Pronunciation, Task Analysis, Difficulty Level, Accuracy, Prediction, Foreign Countries, Models, Auditory Perception, Undergraduate Students, Majors (Students), Contrastive Linguistics
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education; Postsecondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Thailand; United Kingdom
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Author Affiliations: N/A