Effect of multi-lingualism on perception of short and long vowels in Arabic and Japanese

Kimiko Tsukada

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference proceeding contributionpeer-review

    Abstract

    This study compared cross-language speech perception of vowel length contrasts in Arabic and Japanese by two groups of listeners whose first language (L1) was either Cantonese (C) or Korean (K). Unlike Arabic or Japanese, C and K do not use vowel length contrastively. One group (CK+J) had experience learning Japanese as a foreign language while the other (CK) did not. The question of interest was if Japanese learning experience separated the two groups in their perception of Arabic as well as Japanese vowel length contrasts. The effect of learning Japanese was negligible for CK+J who participated in this study. Further, it appeared that learning Japanese had a somewhat negative effect on the listeners’ perception of Arabic contrasts. The pattern of results obtained may reflect a temporary and transient nature of listeners’ interlanguage and has implications for adults’ speech learning capabilities.
    Original languageEnglish
    Title of host publicationProceedings of the 17th international congress of phonetic sciences ICPhS XVII
    EditorsWai-Sum Lee
    Place of PublicationHong Kong
    PublisherCity University
    Pages2034-2037
    Number of pages4
    Publication statusPublished - 2011
    EventInternational Conference on Phonetic Sciences (17th : 2011) - Hong Kong
    Duration: 17 Aug 201121 Aug 2011

    Conference

    ConferenceInternational Conference on Phonetic Sciences (17th : 2011)
    CityHong Kong
    Period17/08/1121/08/11

    Keywords

    • multilingual
    • cross-language speech perception
    • vowel length
    • Cantonese
    • Korean

    Fingerprint

    Dive into the research topics of 'Effect of multi-lingualism on perception of short and long vowels in Arabic and Japanese'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

    Cite this