Individual developmental trajectories in the L2 acquisition of Spanish spirantization

Nagle, Charles L.

doi:10.1075/jslp.3.2.03nag

Cited by 14 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 25 publications

(34 reference statements)

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“…Focusing on Spanish more specifically, a significant body of work has tracked the development of Spanish pronunciation features cross‐sectionally and longitudinally, providing benchmark data on the amount of pronunciation development that can be expected within the context of a communicative language curriculum. Accumulated findings show that classroom language learners’ production of approximant allophones (i.e., [β, ð, ɣ]) in medial contexts (Face & Menke, ; Nagle, ; Shively, ), the tap and trill (Colantoni & Steele, ; Face, ; Major, ; Rose, ), voice onset time in initial stops (Casillas, ; Nagle, ), and some features of Spanish intonation (Zárate–Sández, ) tend to improve with more coursework in L2 Spanish.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploring the Intersection Between Teachers’ Beliefs and Research Findings in Pronunciation Instruction

Nagle¹,

Sachs

Zárate-Sández

2018

The Modern Language Journal

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This study explored teachers’ beliefs about pronunciation instruction in Spanish as a second language (L2). An online survey was used to collect data from 100 participants, grouped into 4 categories based on their previous training in principles and methods of pronunciation instruction. This article reports results from 15 survey items which covered participants’ beliefs regarding 6 major themes: the importance of pronunciation, how pronunciation develops, when to teach it, what to teach, how to teach, and who can teach. Although the results revealed several areas where more methods‐related coursework meant greater alignment between Spanish teachers’ beliefs and findings of L2 pronunciation research, there were other topics on which instructors with more training were likely to express beliefs contrasting with the state of the art. For instance, respondents with more coursework tended to accord more value to pronunciation instruction, to set more pronunciation‐related goals for language instruction, and to reject delaying a focus on pronunciation. Unexpectedly, however, some seemed to uphold the native speaker model, suggesting that teacher training and professional development programs may need to emphasize research‐informed practices and the importance of pedagogical expertise over nativelike pronunciation.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploring the Intersection Between Teachers’ Beliefs and Research Findings in Pronunciation Instruction

Nagle¹,

Sachs

Zárate-Sández

2018

The Modern Language Journal

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“…The current study is part of a larger longitudinal project on L1 English speakers’ perception and production of L2 stops over five data points distributed throughout their second, third, and fourth semesters of college‐level Spanish language instruction (Nagle, , ). With a focus on the perception and production of L2 Spanish stop consonant VOT, this study targeted the temporal characteristics of the perception–production link in instructed L2 acquisition, taking into account three possible configurations: (a) a contemporaneous link, in which perception directly predicts production; (b) delayed models, in which perception predicts production at subsequent data points; and (c) asymptotic models, in which production improves substantially only after perception has reached nativelike accuracy.…”

Section: The Current Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

Examining the Temporal Structure of the Perception–Production Link in Second Language Acquisition: A Longitudinal Study

Nagle

2017

Language Learning

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Most studies on the perception-production link have assumed a synchronous relationship according to which gains in perception transfer to production rapidly and efficiently. However, time-lagged and asymptotic relationships are also possible, where perception would guide production at a later stage or production would improve only once perception has reached a high level of accuracy. This study investigated the temporal dynamics of the perception-production link by modeling English speakers' ability to perceive and produce second language (L2) Spanish stops over time. Mixed-effects modeling of the d perception and voice onset time (VOT) production data demonstrated significant development in both areas. Time-lagged change models indicated a change in d significantly related to decreasing VOT in L2 /p/ at the following testing time, but no significant relationships emerged between perception and production of L2 /b/. Multiple patterns among individuals emerged. Results are interpreted in light of contemporary models of L2 speech learning. IntroductionDuring the first year of life, speech perception becomes attuned to ambient language, such that infants between 6 and 12 months old discriminate native language (L1) contrasts with increasing accuracy, while their ability to discriminate nonnative (L2) contrasts diminishes (Kuhl et al., 2006). By the end of the first year, L1 contrasts are perceived as more distinct than L2 pairs, irrespective of the absolute acoustic distance between constituents, which indicates that phonological categories have begun to coalesce (Cheour et al., 1998). Kuhl and colleagues have demonstrated that perceptual attunement to the L1 fundamentally restructures phonetic space through perceptual warping: L1 prototypes begin to act as perceptual magnets, drawing in adjacent acoustic tokens (Kuhl, 1991(Kuhl, , 2000Kuhl, Conboy, Padden, Nelson, & Pruitt, 2005;Kuhl et al., 2008). Perceptual warping is advantageous because it allows the listener to process the natural variation present in speech with greater efficiency by associating a wider range of acoustic targets with L1 categories. However, L1 perceptual attunement has consequences for L2 speech learning, which may be challenging if the L2 makes use of a portion of phonetic space that is near a L1 category or otherwise involves acoustic cues that are not employed in the L1. Contemporary models of L2 phonetic learning, such as the Speech Learning Model (SLM; Flege, 1995), thus argue that the acquisition of L2 sounds is not constrained by a neurobiological critical period but rather by the developmental state of the L1 system, which is typically robust by the time L2 learning begins. According to L2 models, perceived relationships between L1 and L2 phones shape L2 speech production; if L1 and L2 phones are similar, then learners may not detect the phonetic differences between them, leading to an accented L2 production.Although many studies on the perception-production link in L2 learning have upheld this view, weak or statistically insignific...

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“…In addition to understanding how linguistic variables map onto L2 speech ratings, longitudinal research on L2 pronunciation development has grown to include studies investigating global characteristics of L2 speech, such as comprehensibility and accentedness (Derwing & Munro, ; Derwing, Munro, & Thomson, ; Saito, ) as well as a range of segmental and phonetic features (Casillas, ; Munro & Derwing, ; Munro et al., ; Nagle, , ). Concentrating on the former, accumulated findings indicate that most pronunciation development occurs within a window of maximal opportunity (Derwing & Munro, ), which corresponds to the first few months of intensive L2 contact.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Motivation, Comprehensibility, and Accentedness in L2 Spanish: Investigating Motivation as a Time‐Varying Predictor of Pronunciation Development

Nagle

2018

The Modern Language Journal

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This study examined relationships between language learning motivation and the longitudinal development of second language (L2) pronunciation. Twenty-six English-speaking learners of Spanish recorded a simplified picture description task 5 times over a year-long period spanning their 2nd, 3rd, and 4th semesters of Spanish language instruction. Learners also completed a quantitative motivation survey based on the L2 Motivational Self System and an open-ended questionnaire on their language learning beliefs once per semester, yielding 3 measurements. Eighteen native Spanish listeners rated the learners' clips for comprehensibility and accentedness. Although mixed modeling of the motivation data revealed a slightly negative trajectory for motivational subcomponents, qualitative analyses of individual patterns indicated that learners were beginning to formulate and evaluate language learning goals that were set into a larger framework of personal and professional objectives. Mixed effects models of the pronunciation data demonstrated that both comprehensibility and accentedness improved over time. When the quantitative motivation measures were integrated into the modeling process as time-varying fixed effects, effort was significantly related to accentedness, which suggests that effort may have played an increasingly important role in shaping learners' pronunciation over time.

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Individual developmental trajectories in the L2 acquisition of Spanish spirantization

Cited by 14 publications

References 25 publications

Exploring the Intersection Between Teachers’ Beliefs and Research Findings in Pronunciation Instruction

Exploring the Intersection Between Teachers’ Beliefs and Research Findings in Pronunciation Instruction

Examining the Temporal Structure of the Perception–Production Link in Second Language Acquisition: A Longitudinal Study

Motivation, Comprehensibility, and Accentedness in L2 Spanish: Investigating Motivation as a Time‐Varying Predictor of Pronunciation Development

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