scholarly journals Perception of Japanese length contrasts with reverberation by native and nonnative listeners

2020 ◽  
Vol 41 (5) ◽  
pp. 751-760
Author(s):  
Eri Osawa ◽  
Takayuki Arai ◽  
Nao Hodoshima
Keyword(s):  
Nonnative Listeners

Effects of language experience on the discrimination of the Portuguese palatal lateral by nonnative listeners

2016 ◽  
pp. 1-15
Author(s):  
Daniela Santos Oliveira ◽  
Devin M. Casenhiser ◽  
Mark Hedrick ◽  
António Teixeira ◽  
Ferenc Bunta
Keyword(s):  
Language Experience ◽  
Nonnative Listeners

The effect of background noise on the ability to perceive and remember unrelated words in nonnative listeners

2013 ◽  
Vol 133 (5) ◽  
pp. 3392-3392
Author(s):  
Meital Avivi-Reich ◽  
Caterina Y. Leung ◽  
Bruce A. Schneider
Keyword(s):  
Background Noise ◽  
Nonnative Listeners

Native and nonnative processing of Japanese pitch accent

2011 ◽  
Vol 33 (3) ◽  
pp. 623-641 ◽  
Author(s):  
XIANGHUA WU ◽  
JUNG-YUEH TU ◽  
YUE WANG
Keyword(s):  
Left Hemisphere ◽  
Right Hemisphere ◽  
Pitch Accent ◽  
Lexical Tone ◽  
Language Experience ◽  
Tone Language ◽  
Hemisphere Dominance ◽  
Nonnative Listeners ◽  
Prosodic Processing ◽  
Japanese Pitch Accent

ABSTRACTThe theoretical framework of this study is based on the prevalent debate of whether prosodic processing is influenced by higher level linguistic-specific circuits or reflects lower level encoding of physical properties. Using the dichotic listening technique, the study investigates the hemispheric processing of Japanese pitch accent by native Japanese listeners and two groups of nonnative listeners with no prior pitch accent experience but differing in their native language experience with linguistic pitch: native listeners of Mandarin (a tone language with higher linguistic functional use of pitch) and native listeners of English (a stress language with lower functional use of pitch). The overall results reveal that, for both native and nonnative listeners, the processing of Japanese pitch accent is less lateralized (compared to lexical tone processing, which has been found to be a left hemisphere property). However, detailed analysis with individual pitch accents across groups shows a right hemisphere preference for processing the high–accent–low (H*L) pattern, a left hemisphere preference for LH*, and no hemisphere dominance for LH, indicating a significant reliance on the acoustic cues. These patterns are particularly prominent with the English listeners who are least experienced with linguistic pitch. Together, the findings suggest an interplay of linguistic and acoustic aspects in the processing of Japanese pitch accent by native and nonnative listeners.

scholarly journals The role of linguistic experience in the hemispheric processing of lexical tone

2004 ◽  
Vol 25 (3) ◽  
pp. 449-466 ◽  
Author(s):  
YUE WANG ◽  
DAWN M. BEHNE ◽  
ALLARD JONGMAN ◽  
JOAN A. SERENO
Keyword(s):  
Left Hemisphere ◽  
Hemispheric Lateralization ◽  
Lexical Tone ◽  
Hemispheric Processing ◽  
Linguistic Experience ◽  
Hemisphere Dominance ◽  
Ear Advantage ◽  
Nonnative Listeners ◽  
Mandarin Tone

This study investigated hemispheric lateralization of Mandarin tone. Four groups of listeners were examined: native Mandarin listeners, English–Mandarin bilinguals, Norwegian listeners with experience with Norwegian tone, and American listeners with no tone experience. Tone pairs were dichotically presented and listeners identified which tone they heard in each ear. For the Mandarin listeners, 57% of the total errors occurred in the left ear, indicating a right-ear (left-hemisphere) advantage. The English–Mandarin bilinguals exhibited nativelike patterns, with 56% left-ear errors. However, no ear advantage was found for the Norwegian or American listeners (48 and 47% left-ear errors, respectively). Results indicate left-hemisphere dominance of Mandarin tone by native and proficient bilingual listeners, whereas nonnative listeners show no evidence of lateralization, regardless of their familiarity with lexical tone.

Nonnative English Speaker Performance on the Basic English Lexicon (BEL) Sentences

2013 ◽  
Vol 56 (3) ◽  
pp. 792-804 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stacey Rimikis ◽  
Rajka Smiljanic ◽  
Lauren Calandruccio
Keyword(s):  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Recognition Performance ◽  
Nonnative Speakers ◽  
Cultural Backgrounds ◽  
Online Questionnaire ◽  
Spoken English ◽  
Sentence Recognition ◽  
Nonnative Speakers Of English ◽  
Nonnative Listeners ◽  
Basic English

Purpose The purpose of this study was to examine sentence-recognition performance for a large, diverse group of nonnative speakers of English on the recently developed Basic English Lexicon (BEL) sentence materials and to determine whether BEL sentence lists are equated in difficulty for this population. Method The BEL sentences were presented to 102 nonnative speakers of English with normal hearing and varied linguistic and cultural backgrounds. Five hundred sentences were presented mixed with noise spectrally matched to the target sentences. Subjects completed an online questionnaire providing detailed demographic and linguistic information. Listeners' spoken English proficiency was also assessed using the Versant English Test (Pearson Education, 2010). Results Nonnative listeners showed equal word-recognition performance for 3 groups of BEL sentence lists, each group containing sentence lists that had equivalent difficulty. In addition, spoken language proficiency and several demographic and linguistic factors were significantly correlated with BEL performance. Conclusion The BEL sentence materials have been tested on a large cohort of nonnative speakers of English and have been found to be appropriate for use in speech-perception testing with this population.

scholarly journals Native and Non-Native Listeners Perceptual Judgement of English Accentedness, Intelligibility, and Acceptability of Indonesian Speakers

2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 39
Author(s):  
Syifa' Khuriyatuz Zahro
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Research ◽  
Speech Perception ◽  
Foreign Accent ◽  
Speech Perception In Noise ◽  
Correlation Test ◽  
Purposive Sampling ◽  
Accented Speech ◽  
Perceptual Judgement ◽  
Noise Test ◽  
Nonnative Listeners

This research aimed at investigating the extent of accentedness and intelligibility as well as the acceptability of Indonesian foreign-accented speech perceived by native and non-native listeners, as well as finding their correlation to each other. It used qualitative research. The participant of the research was selected using purposive sampling. The participants were divided into speakers and listeners. There are six speakers and four listeners selected. The four listeners were native and nonnative listeners who rated and transcribed six recorded reading of Indonesian speakers by means of SPIN (Speech Perception in Noise) test. The results show that native listeners rate the speech almost the same way as non-native listeners do. The speeches with clear and accurate pronunciation are rated highly accepted and fully intelligible, regardless of having a very strong accent. In contrast, less clear and accurate pronunciations, as well as a very strong accent of the speeches, are rated unacceptable and still reasonably intelligible. The result of the correlation test between accentedness and intelligibility as well as accentedness and acceptability of the accent finds on no account of correlation to each other. Therefore, accentedness and intelligibility plus accentedness and acceptability of the accent are independent, so that strong foreign accent could stay acceptable and intelligible. The factors found to influence the judgment are the familiarity of the accent, clarity, and accuracy of pronunciation. Aforementioned findings have implication to challenge English teachers in Indonesia to develop meaningful activities to teach English pronunciation accurately to be regarded as fully intelligible and acceptable by listeners, especially native English listeners.

scholarly journals Perceptual restoration of locally time-reversed speech: Non-native listeners’ performance in their L2 vs. L1

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mako Ishida
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Speech Signal ◽  
The Other ◽  
Unique Characteristic ◽  
Japanese Language ◽  
Native Japanese Speakers ◽  
Degraded Speech ◽  
Nonnative Listeners ◽  
Linguistic Units ◽  
L1 English

AbstractNonnative listeners are generally not as good as native listeners in perceptually restoring degraded speech and understand what was being said. The current study investigates how nonnative listeners of English (namely, native Japanese speakers who learned English as a second language) perceptually restore temporally distorted speech in their L2 English as compared with native English listeners (L1 English) reported in Ishida et al. (Cognition, 151, 68–75, 2016), and as compared with the listeners’ native tongue (L1 Japanese). In the experiment, listeners listened to locally time-reversed words and pseudowords in their L2 English and L1 Japanese where every 10, 30, 50, 70, 90, or 110 ms of speech signal was flipped in time—these stimuli contained either many fricatives or stops. The results suggested that the intelligibility of locally time-reversed words and pseudowords deteriorated as the length of reversed segments increased in both listeners’ L2 English and L1 Japanese, while listeners understood locally time-reversed speech more in their L1 Japanese. In addition, lexical context supported perceptual restoration in both listeners’ L1 Japanese and L2 English, while phonemic constituents affected perceptual restoration significantly only in listeners’ L1. On the other hand, locally time-reversed words and pseudowords in L1 Japanese were much more intelligible than those in L1 English reported in Ishida et al. It is possible that the intelligibility of temporally distorted lexical items depends on the structure of basic linguistic units in each language, and the Japanese language might have a unique characteristic because of its CV and V structure.

Listening Effort by Native and Nonnative Listeners Due to Noise, Reverberation, and Talker Foreign Accent During English Speech Perception

2019 ◽  
Vol 62 (4) ◽  
pp. 1068-1081 ◽  
Author(s):  
Z. Ellen Peng ◽  
Lily M. Wang
Keyword(s):  
Dual Task ◽  
Self Report ◽  
Speech Comprehension ◽  
Listening Effort ◽  
Language Abilities ◽  
Accented Speech ◽  
Perceived Performance ◽  
Nasa Tlx ◽  
Nonnative Listeners ◽  
Acoustic Conditions

Purpose Understanding speech in complex realistic acoustic environments requires effort. In everyday listening situations, speech quality is often degraded due to adverse acoustics, such as excessive background noise level (BNL) and reverberation time (RT), or talker characteristics such as foreign accent ( Mattys, Davis, Bradlow, & Scott, 2012 ). In addition to factors affecting the quality of the input acoustic signals, listeners' individual characteristics such as language abilities can also make it more difficult and effortful to understand speech. Based on the Framework for Understanding Effortful Listening ( Pichora-Fuller et al., 2016 ), factors such as adverse acoustics, talker accent, and listener language abilities can all contribute to increasing listening effort. In this study, using both a dual-task paradigm and a self-report questionnaire, we seek to understand listening effort in a wide range of realistic classroom acoustic conditions as well as varying talker accent and listener English proficiency. Method One hundred fifteen native and nonnative adult listeners with normal hearing were tested in a dual task of speech comprehension and adaptive pursuit rotor (APR) under 15 acoustic conditions from combinations of BNLs and RTs. Listeners provided responses on the NASA Task Load Index (TLX) questionnaire immediately after completing the dual task under each acoustic condition. The NASA TLX surveyed 6 dimensions of perceived listening effort: mental demand, physical demand, temporal demand, effort, frustration, and perceived performance. Fifty-six listeners were tested with speech produced by native American English talkers; the other 59 listeners, with speech from native Mandarin Chinese talkers. Based on their 1st language learned during childhood, 3 groups of listeners were recruited: listeners who were native English speakers, native Mandarin Chinese speakers, and native speakers of other languages (e.g., Hindu, Korean, and Portuguese). Results Listening effort was measured objectively through the APR task performance and subjectively using the NASA TLX questionnaire. Performance on the APR task did not vary with changing acoustic conditions, but it did suggest increased listening effort for native listeners of other languages compared to the 2 other listener groups. From the NASA TLX, listeners reported feeling more frustrated and less successful in understanding Chinese-accented speech. Nonnative listeners reported more listening effort (i.e., physical demand, temporal demand, and effort) than native listeners in speech comprehension under adverse acoustics. When listeners' English proficiency was controlled, higher BNL was strongly related to a decrease in perceived performance, whereas such relationship with RT was much weaker. Nonnative listeners who shared the foreign talkers' accent reported no change in listening effort, whereas other listeners reported more difficulty in understanding the accented speech. Conclusions Adverse acoustics required more effortful listening as measured subjectively with a self-report NASA TLX. This subjective scale was more sensitive than a dual task that involved speech comprehension, which was beyond sentence recall. It was better at capturing the negative impacts on listening effort from acoustic factors (i.e., both BNL and RT), talker accent, and listener language abilities.

scholarly journals Shedding New Light on the Evaluation of Accented Speakers: Basic Mechanisms Behind Nonnative Listeners’ Evaluations of Nonnative Accented Job Candidates

2017 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-32 ◽  
Author(s):  
Janin Roessel ◽  
Christiane Schoel ◽  
Renate Zimmermann ◽  
Dagmar Stahlberg
Keyword(s):  
Native Speaker ◽  
Language Attitudes ◽  
Nonnative Speakers ◽  
Effective Intervention ◽  
Job Candidates ◽  
Employment Situation ◽  
Nonnative Listeners ◽  
German Speaker

The present research unites two emergent trends in the area of language attitudes: (a) research on perceptions of nonnative speakers by nonnative listeners and (b) the search for general, basic mechanisms underlying the evaluation of nonnative accented speakers. In three experiments featuring an employment situation, German participants listened to a presentation given in English by a German speaker with a strong versus native-like accent (in Studies 1–3) versus a native speaker of English (in Study 1). They evaluated candidates with a strong accent worse than candidates with a native(-like) pronunciation—even to the degree that the quality of arguments was of no relevance (Study 1). Study 2 introduces an effective intervention to reduce these discriminatory tendencies. Across studies, affect and competence emerged as major mediators of hirability evaluations. Study 3 further revealed sequential indirect influences, which advance our understanding of previous inconsistent findings regarding disfluency and warmth perceptions.

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