Experience with a second language affects the use of fundamental frequency in speech segmentation

Abstract

This study investigates whether listeners’ experience with a second language learned later in life affects their use of fundamental frequency (F0) as a cue to word boundaries in the segmentation of an artificial language (AL), particularly when the cues to word boundaries conflict between the first language (L1) and second language (L2). F0 signals phrase-final (and thus word-final) boundaries in French but word-initial boundaries in English. Participants were functionally monolingual French listeners, functionally monolingual English listeners, bilingual L1-English L2-French listeners, and bilingual L1-French L2-English listeners. They completed the AL-segmentation task with F0 signaling word-final boundaries or without prosodic cues to word boundaries (monolingual groups only). After listening to the AL, participants completed a forced-choice word-identification task in which the foils were either non-words or part-words. The results show that the monolingual French listeners, but not the monolingual English listeners, performed better in the presence of F0 cues than in the absence of such cues. Moreover, bilingual status modulated listeners’ use of F0 cues to word-final boundaries, with bilingual French listeners performing less accurately than monolingual French listeners on both word types but with bilingual English listeners performing more accurately than monolingual English listeners on non-words. These findings not only confirm that speech segmentation is modulated by the L1, but also newly demonstrate that listeners’ experience with the L2 (French or English) affects their use of F0 cues in speech segmentation. This suggests that listeners’ use of prosodic cues to word boundaries is adaptive and non-selective, and can change as a function of language experience.

Re-examining the effect of phonological similarity between the native- and second-language intonational systems in second-language speech segmentation

“…One straightforward explanation of these results is that the learning of intonational cues may be more difficult if it requires listeners to suppress an L1-based relationship between a cue and a word edge than if it requires them to learn a new, L2-based relationship between a cue and a word edge. Functionally monolingual English listeners have been shown to use F0 rise as a cue to word-initial boundaries but not as a cue to word-final boundaries (e.g., Tremblay, Namjoshi, Spinelli, Broersma, Cho, Kim, Martínez-García & Connell, 2017; Tyler & Cutler, 2009). For English listeners, therefore, suppressing the association between an H tone and word-initial boundaries is more difficult to accomplish than learning a new association between an H tone and the last syllable of a phrase-final word.…”

Phonetic and phonological effects of tonal information in the segmentation of Korean speech: An artificial-language segmentation study

“…boundary in the native and unfamiliar languages, segmentation of the unfamiliar language is enhanced, whereas if a given cue signals different word boundaries in the two languages, segmentation of the unfamiliar language is inhibited (e.g., Kim et al, 2012;Tremblay et al, 2017;Tyler & Cutler, 2009). What is unclear from this research, however, is how the fine-grained phonetic realization of a given cue to word boundary impacts speech segmentation in cases where the cue signals the same word boundary in the native and unfamiliar languages but does so differently in the two languages.…”

Adaptive and selective production of syllable duration and fundamental frequency as word segmentation cues by French-English bilinguals

“…For example, Tremblay et al (2012) found that as the French-L2 proficiency of English-L1 learners increased, so did their reliance on phrase-final lengthening to locate word boundaries in French. Furthermore, Tremblay et al (2017) showed that English native speakers who have reached a high proficiency level in L2-French used F0 as a word offset cue in an artificial language learning paradigm, while monolingual English speakers did not. In turn, French native speakers who have reached a high proficiency level in L2-English relied less on F0 as a word offset cue than did monolingual French speakers (Tremblay et al, 2017).…”

“…Furthermore, Tremblay et al (2017) showed that English native speakers who have reached a high proficiency level in L2-French used F0 as a word offset cue in an artificial language learning paradigm, while monolingual English speakers did not. In turn, French native speakers who have reached a high proficiency level in L2-English relied less on F0 as a word offset cue than did monolingual French speakers (Tremblay et al, 2017). These results prompted the authors to suggest that "listeners' use of prosodic cues to word boundaries is, at least to some degree, adaptive (i.e., it is modulated by both L1 and L2 experience), and it is not selective (i.e., segmentation strategies cannot be selected as a function of how useful they are for segmenting the unfamiliar language)" (Tremblay et al, 2017, p. 14).…”