Doctoral Dissertation Research: Perception and production of vowel contrasts in Welsh-Spanish bilinguals

尽管双语或多种语言是世界各地的常态，但大部分的语言学研究都集中在单一语言人群上。当前的第二语言习得理论认为，准确的第二语言声音感知是1)与说话人在个体层面上的发音能力相关的，2)依赖于母语和目标语之间明显的相似性。这个项目用实验和自然收集的语言数据来检验这些假设。考察这些影响是找出任何特定第二语言学习者的困难领域的第一步，这将有助于开发适合任何个体学习者和所述语言的教育方法。这一项目的结果有可能推动美国的英语作为第二语言的倡议和外语教育方法。该项目使用从语音、语音和心理语言学研究中提取的方法，用从阿根廷威尔士-西班牙语双语者中收集的数据来检验上述预测。这些人的年龄和语言学习背景各不相同，这使他们成为理想的测试群体，而威尔士语元音系统的性质为以西班牙语为母语的人提供了一套有限的可测试的习得挑战。一项阅读任务将促使测试组产生威尔士语和西班牙语元音，并控制说威尔士语的人和说单一西班牙语的阿根廷人的人数。对控制组语音的统计分析将被用来预测哪些威尔士语元音的对比可能会对母语为西班牙语的人构成挑战。结果将与1)双语者在元音识别和辨别方面的准确性以及2)双语者的元音发音与对照组的相似程度进行比较。了解元音对比习得对这一人群的挑战将导致对双语领域第二语言习得的性质和后果的可扩展预测。

Although bilingualism or multilingualism is the norm around the world, the bulk of linguistic research has focused on monolingual populations. Current theories of second language acquisition maintain that accurate second language sound perception is 1) correlated with speakers' production ability on an individual level and 2) dependent on observable similarities between the native and target language. This project tests these hypotheses with experimental and naturally collected language data. Examining these effects is the first step toward identifying areas of difficulty for learners of any given second language, which will contribute to development of educational methods tailored to any individual learner and language in question. The results of this project have the potential to advance both English as a Second Language initiatives and foreign language education methods in the U.S.Using methods drawn from phonological, phonetic, and psycholinguistic research, this project tests the above predictions with data collected from an understudied population of Welsh-Spanish bilinguals in Argentina. This population has variation in age and language learning backgrounds which makes it an ideal testing group, while the nature of the Welsh vowel system provides a constrained set of testable acquisition challenges for native Spanish speakers. A reading task will elicit productions of Welsh and Spanish vowels from the test group and control populations of Welsh speakers in Wales and Argentine Spanish monolinguals. Statistical analysis of control group speech will be used to predict which Welsh vowel contrasts are likely to challenge native speakers of Spanish. Results will be compared to 1) bilinguals' accuracy in vowel identification and discrimination and 2) the similarity of bilinguals' vowel productions to those of the control groups. Understanding the challenges of vowel contrast acquisition for this population will result in scalable predictions regarding the nature and consequences of second language acquisition for the field of bilingualism.