This article examines the influence of gradient foreign accentedness on lexical competition during spoken word recognition. Using native and Mandarin-accented English words ranging in degree of foreign accentedness, we investigate the effect of increased accentedness on (a) the size of the competitor space and (b) the strength and duration of…

I taught music in three schools where 10-40% of the student population spoke another language at home. I ran an all-select choir for Kindergarten, Primary, Junior and Intermediate students once per week. I was interested in answering the following questions: What impact might weekly rehearsals of an all-select choir have on language learning? How…

To be effective second or additional language (L2) listeners, learners should be aware of typical processes in connected L2 speech (e.g. linking). This longitudinal study explored how learners' developing ability to perceive connected L2 speech was related to the quality of their language awareness. Thirty-two learners of L2 French at a university…

The present investigation examines English speakers' ability to identify and discriminate non-native consonant length contrast. Three groups (L1 English No-Instruction, L1 English Instruction, and L1 Finnish control) performed a speeded forced-choice identification task and a speeded AX discrimination task on Finnish non-words (e.g.…

This study investigated the perception of Canadian French word-final vowels by English-dominant and French-dominant bilinguals living in Montreal. In a modified identification task, listeners selected the response that rhymed with the target word, embedded in a carrier sentence. Minimal sets of real and nonsense target words were used, contrasting…

This paper first provides an overview of factors that constrain ultimate attainment in adult second language (L2) pronunciation, finding that first language influence and the quantity and quality of L2 phonetic input account for much of the variation in the degree of foreign accent found across adult L2 learners. The author then evaluates current…

This research investigates whether English speakers who learn Mandarin Chinese via a familiar orthography differ from those who learn via a non-familiar orthography in their perception of English-Mandarin sound pairs. Canadian English speakers (n = 32) participated in a series of experimental tasks. The tasks included pre- and posttest perception…

L1-Spanish L2-English listeners' perception of a Canadian-English /bIt/-/bId/-/bit/-/bid/ continuum was investigated. Results were largely consistent with the developmental stages for L1-Spanish listeners' acquisition of English /i/ and /I/ hypothesized by Escudero (2000): Stage 0, inability to distinguish. Stage 1, duration based. Stage 2,…

This study focused on auditory perception, or phonetic discrimination, in foreign language learning. Subjects of the study were English-speakers (n=35) learning French. Researchers measured subjects' auditory sensibility, comparing it with progress in phonetic discrimination during the school year. Progress in the latter was measured by both a…

A perceptual fading technique was used to teach unilingual adult Canadian francophones to identify the voiceless and voiced linguadental fricatives of English. After just 90 minutes of training, subjects were better able to identify both the training stimuli and an untrained set of natural consonant-vowel exemplars produced by 4 different…

To examine the perceptual acquisition of Thai voice and aspiration contrasts, Canadian native English and native French speakers were taught 18 Thai words and then tested midpoint during training, on the day following training, and after one week with no exposure to Thai. Results indicated that both groups lexically represented voice contrasts…