Production and Perception of Intonation Patterns in Second Language Acquisition

我们准备了日语和英语的各种语调的句子作为语言材料。这些句子是由说日语的人和说美国话的人产生的。采用了一种使用个人电脑的语调训练装置，并在不同的日子举行了四次会议。本实验的目的是找出最有效的英语和日语语调模式习得方法。我们发现，当学习者的句子的语调曲线与他们的口语产出一起显示时，学习者的进步程度最大。此外，不同类型的语调模式在习得过程中也存在不同的难度。另一个产出实验是关于英语和日语的对比重音的实现，实验对象是英语母语者和日语学习者。在元音的语调模式和时间控制方面存在显著差异。此外，对比重音词在句子中的位置也会影响习得的难度。进一步的研究考察了美国人和日本人英语学习者英语重读元音的自然度阈值。相反，日本口音元音的自然度阈值的日本人说的美国学习者进行了比较。我们发现某些因素，如音位元音长度的区别和语音条件效应，这对这些判断的自然性产生了影响。

We prepared Japanese and English sentences with various intonation patterns as linguistic materials. The sentences were produced by Japanese speakers and American speakers. An Intonation Training Device which uses a personal computer was employed and four sessions were held on different days. Thepurpose of this production experiment was to find out the most effective method for the acquisition of intonation patterns in English and Japanese. We found that the learners made progress to the greatest degree when the intonation curves of sentences by the learners were displayd over those by a native speaker of the language together with their oral production of those sentences. Also, different degrees of difficulty in the acquisition were shown for various types of intonation patterns.Another production experiment was carried out on the realization of contrastive stress in English and Japanese by the native speakers and the learners of each language. Significant differences were observed in the intonation patterns and the timing control of vowels. Also, the position of the word with contrastive stress in a sentencewas found to have effect on the difficulty of acquisition. Further study examined the naturalness threshold of English stressed vowels for Americans and Japanese learners of English. Conversely, the naturalness threshold of Japanese accented vowels for Japanese speakers was compared to that of Japanese spoken by American learners. We found certain factors, such as phonemic vowel length distinction and a voice-conditioned effect, which exerted an influence on these judgments of naturalness.