Doctoral Dissertation Research: The role of visual cues in imitating a new sound

一个人是如何学会用第二语言发出一个新声音的？这项研究的重点是第二语言学习者学习发出新声音的一种可能机制：内隐模仿。具体来说，这项研究试图了解视觉线索是否会促进对新声音的内隐模仿，从而有助于发展第二语言的语言生产。先前的研究表明，在交谈过程中，成年人会自动、迅速地与对话者融合起来，让自己的声音听起来更像自己。事实上，这种趋同甚至发生在看到但没有听到对话者的时候。不仅视觉语言本身会引起模仿，而且视觉语言比听觉语言更容易被模仿。提出的一系列实验将检查儿童和成人模仿不熟悉声音的程度，包括手势和声音，以确定他们是否从同样的声音的视听和听觉暴露中获得任何好处。这项研究的最后一个组成部分将是确定不同的说话区如何帮助模仿。这些实验的结果应该有助于理解视觉模态与第二语言学习的关系，并确定儿童在语言处理中依赖视觉线索的程度。

How does a person learn to produce a new sound in a second language? The proposed study focuses on one possible mechanism by which a second-language learner might learn to produce a new sound: implicit imitation. Specifically, this study seeks to understand whether visual cues might facilitate implicit imitation of new sounds and thus help with developing speech production in a second language. Previous research shows that during a conversation, adults automatically and quickly converge with their interlocutors to sound more like them. In fact, this convergence occurs even when see, but do not hear the interlocutor. Not only does visual speech elicit imitation on its own, but imitation is greater for audiovisual speech than for auditory-only speech. The proposed set of experiments will examine how closely children and adults imitate the productions of unfamiliar sounds, both gesturally and acoustically, to determine whether they derive any benefit from audiovisual versus auditory exposure to the same sounds. The final component of this study will be to determine how different speaking registers can aid in imitation. The results of these experiments should add to an understanding of how the visual modality is relevant to second language learning, as well as determine the extent to which children rely on visual cues in speech processing.