Cross-language Perception of Non-native Tonal Contrasts: Effects of Native Phonological and Phonetic Influences

Connie K. So · Catherine T. Best

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Phonetics and Phonology Research Neuroscience and Music Perception Categorization, perception, and language

Abstract

This study examined the perception of the four Mandarin lexical tones by Mandarin-naïve Hong Kong Cantonese, Japanese, and Canadian English listener groups. Their performance on an identification task, following a brief familiarization task, was analyzed in terms of tonal sensitivities (A-prime scores on correct identifications) and tonal errors (confusions). The A-prime results revealed that the English listeners' sensitivity to Tone 4 identifications specifically was significantly lower than that of the other two groups. The analysis of tonal errors revealed that all listener groups showed perceptual confusion of tone pairs with similar phonetic features (T1-T2, T1-T4 and T2-T3 pairs), but not of those with completely dissimilar features (T1-T3, T2-T4, and T3-T4). Language-specific errors were also observed in their performance, which may be explained within the framework of the Perceptual Assimilation Model (PAM: Best, 1995; Best & Tyler, 2007). The findings imply that linguistic experience with native tones does not necessarily facilitate non-native tone perception. Rather, the phonemic status and the phonetic features (similarities or dissimilarities) between the tonal systems of the target language and the listeners' native languages play critical roles in the perception of non-native tones.

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References

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2012Second language acquisition of Mandarin Chinese tones by tonal and non-tonal language speakers 2012When does native language input affect phonetic perception? The precocious case of lexical tone 2015Beyond Segments: Towards a L2 Intonation Learning Theory 2015Flexibility in Bilingual Infants' Word Learning 2014PHONETIC INFLUENCES ON ENGLISH AND FRENCH LISTENERS’ ASSIMILATION OF MANDARIN TONES TO NATIVE PROSODIC CATEGORIES 2013Unfamiliar orthographic information and second language word learning: A novel lexicon study

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