(Not so) Great Expectations: Listening to Foreign-Accented Speech Reduces the Brain’s Anticipatory Processes

Abstract

This study examines the effect of foreign-accented speech on the predictive ability of our brain. Listeners actively anticipate upcoming linguistic information in the speech signal so as to facilitate and reduce processing load. However, it is unclear whether or not listeners also do this when they are exposed to speech from non-native speakers. In the present study, we exposed native Dutch listeners to sentences produced d non-native speakers while measuring their brain activity using electroencephalography. We found that listeners' brain activity differed depending on whether they listened to native or nonnative speech. However, participants' overall performance as measured by word recall rate was unaffected. We discussed the results in relation to previous findings as well as the automaticity of anticipation.

The costs (and benefits) of effortful listening on context processing: A simultaneous electrophysiology, pupillometry, and behavioral study

“…Obleser and Kotz (2011) experimentally manipulated stimulus degradation via noise vocoding (see Shannon et al, 1995) and found that the N400 mean amplitude decreased and peak latency increased as speech intelligibility decreased (see also Strauβ, Kotz, & Obleser, 2013;Aydelott et al, 2006). Similarly, Romero-Rivas and colleagues (2016) reported findings in which there was a reduced N400 context effect when listening to foreign-accented speech, which is also theorized to induce listening effort (see also Goslin et al, 2012;Schiller et al, 2020). Collectively, these studies suggest that a listener's ability to use context to facilitate online lexical semantic processing may be compromised when listening to perceptually challenging speech.…”

“…Although research on listening effort dates back to the 1960s (e.g., Rabbitt, 1968), the factors underlying effortful listening and its impacts on higher level language comprehension are not well understood. For example, although it has been proposed that listeners can use semantic and syntactic information available in the ongoing linguistic context to mitigate the effects of effortful listening (e.g., Pichora-Fuller, 2008;Sheldon et al, 2008;Benichov et al, 2012;Lash et al, 2013), other work in a growing body of research in the field of cognitive electrophysiology that has shown that a listener's ability to use context to facilitate online word processing (e.g., as reflected by the N400 component of the event-related brain potential, ERP), is reduced when listening is more effortful (e.g., Romero-Rivas et al, 2016;Schiller et al, 2020).…”

The effect of hyperarticulation on speech comprehension under adverse listening conditions

“…This lack of early brain activity, suggesting that there was no word anticipation, was indicated by the absence of phonological mismatch negativity (PMN) in foreign-accented speech. By contrast, later ERP components did not reveal any significant difference between native and foreign-accented speech processing, implying that listeners’ overall performance was not affected depending on whether they listened to sentences in native or non-native accents (Schiller et al, 2020 ). This shows that foreign-accented speech only affected the early stages of speech processing and there was no difference in the understanding of native and foreign-accented speech at a later stage.…”

“…Nonetheless, it was noted that the level of semantic activation appeared more superficial when listeners heard the sentences in a foreign accent, implying a differential processing of native-accented and foreign-accented speech. To address this point and investigate the aspect of anticipation directly, a recent ERP study was conducted that aimed to provide more insight into whether foreigner-accented speech reduces or increases anticipation (Schiller et al, 2020 ). It used a within-participants design and monitored brain-activity before the presentation of the critical word.…”

“…Previous research has also suggested a more shallow semantic activation in listeners when they heard speech in a foreign accent compared to speech with no accent (Romero-Rivas et al, 2016 ), indicating that foreign-accented speech and native-accented speech are processed differently. However, more recent research revealed that foreign-accented speech affected understanding only during the early stage of speech processing while there was no difference in listeners’ processing of native and foreign-accented speech at the later stage (Schiller et al, 2020 ). This implies that listeners’ overall understanding was not influenced by the presence or absence of an accent.…”