Can co-speech hand gestures facilitate learning of non-native tones?

Eng, Katelyn; Hannah, Beverly; Leong, Lindsay; Wang, Yue

doi:10.1121/1.4799746

Cited by 2 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 0 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Thus, in natural speech, there appears to be a direct relation, though not a semantic one, between beat gestures and prosodic prominence. While prior research has reported some positive trends for the effect of gesture on L2 prosody learning [18][19], findings are often barely significant [20][21], and studies reporting no gestural benefit also exist [22][23]. A potential explanation for these varying findings is that factors like gesture type (i.e., beat or metaphoric), physical involvement level (i.e., producing or perceiving gestures), and learner characteristics might be important in determining the effectiveness of gestures in L2 prosody training.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 92%

Learning L2 Prosody using Gestures: The Role of Individual Differences related to Musicality

Maastricht¹,

Hoetjes²,

Heijden³

2022

Speech Prosody 2022

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The present study aimed to disentangle the influence of gesture type, physical involvement level, and individual differences in learner characteristics, i.e., working memory (WM) capacity and musicality, in determining the effectiveness of L2 lexical stress training. To this end, 60 native speakers of Dutch read aloud Spanish phrases containing cognates, which were counterbalanced for lexical stress position compared to their Dutch counterpart (e.g., 'piRÁmides' in Spanish, 'piraMIdes' in Dutch). They did so as a pre-test before receiving lexical stress training (T1) and as a post-test both directly after training (T2), and approximately one hour later (T3). Subjects received lexical stress training in one of five conditions varying in gesture type and physical involvement level: audio-visual (AV), AV-beat-perception, AV-beat-production, AVmetaphoric-perception, AV-metaphoric-production. Between T2 and T3, subjects performed a WM capacity and musical aptitude task. The results show that irrespective of training condition subjects significantly improved their L2 lexical stress production from T1 to T2 and T3. Although differences between training conditions were non-significant, there were several significant three-way interactions between WM capacity or musical aptitude and testing time and training condition. This underlines the importance of considering task and learner characteristics in determining the gestural benefit in learning L2 prosody.

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 92%

Learning L2 Prosody using Gestures: The Role of Individual Differences related to Musicality

Maastricht¹,

Hoetjes²,

Heijden³

2022

Speech Prosody 2022

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

What makes second language perception of Mandarin tones hard?

Pelzl

2019

CSL

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Mandarin Chinese tones are known to be difficult for second language learners. A large body of research has examined non-native perception of tones, and may provide useful and interesting insights about the sources of tone learning difficulty for Chinese teachers and learners. However, much of the literature is in journals that may be difficult to access or written in technical language that may be hard for non-specialists to understand. This review article aims to summarize key findings from this research in an accessible fashion. I will draw on the research to answer five broad questions: (1) Why are tones more difficult for some learners than others? (2) Why are some tones more difficult than others? (3) Why are tones in words more difficult than in meaningless syllables? (4) Why are tones in context more difficult than in isolation? (5) What can we do about tone learning difficulties?

show abstract

Can co-speech hand gestures facilitate learning of non-native tones?

Cited by 2 publications

References 0 publications

Learning L2 Prosody using Gestures: The Role of Individual Differences related to Musicality

Learning L2 Prosody using Gestures: The Role of Individual Differences related to Musicality

What makes second language perception of Mandarin tones hard?

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About