The effect of task complexity on functional adequacy, fluency and lexical diversity in speaking performances of native and non-native speakers

Jong, Nivja H. de; Steinel, Margarita P.; Florijn, A.F.; Schoonen, Rob; Hulstijn, Jan H.

doi:10.1075/lllt.32.06jon

Cited by 55 publications

(66 citation statements)

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“…First, the analyses of L2 pronunciation proficiency in this study were based on a particular group of L2 learners (40 Japanese students learning L2 English in FL settings) who engaged in a single task-a timed picture description. Since the linguistic characteristics of L2 learners' speech have been found to vary according to different types of task conditions (e.g., Ahmadian & Tavakoli, 2011 for task repetition; for pre-task and online planning time) and learner factors (e.g., De Jong et al, 2012 for proficiency levels; Lahmann et al, 2017 for age of testing), the findings of the current study need to be replicated with larger samples of participants with various ages (young/adult) and linguistic (L1/L2) backgrounds while adopting multiple task modalities and demands.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Following De Jong, Steinel, Florijn, Schoonen, and Hulstijn's (2012) notion of fluency, three measures were developed to objectively analyze the three temporal aspects of L2 pronunciation proficiency: (a) breakdown (how effortlessly speech is articulated without many pauses and hesitations), (b) speed (how many words/syllables are produced within a certain period of time) and (c) repair (how often corrections and repetitions are present in speech) (see also Bosker et al, 2013).…”

Section: Temporal Analysesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Breakdown fluency was measured by dividing the total number of filled pauses (e.g., eh, ah, oh) and unfilled pauses (i.e., silence) over the total number of words. The number of filled pauses was counted based on raw transcripts, and the number of unfilled silent pauses was automatically calculated via a script programmed in Praat with the minimum length of silence set at 250 milliseconds (for a similar decision, see De Jong et al, 2012).…”

Section: Temporal Analysesmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Aptitude, Experience, and Second Language Pronunciation Proficiency Development in Classroom Settings

Saito

Suzukida

Sun

2018

Stud Second Lang Acquis

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The current study longitudinally examined the influence of aptitude on second language (L2) pronunciation development when 40 firstyear Japanese university students engaged in practice activities inside and outside English-as-a-Foreign-Language classrooms over one academic year. Spontaneous speech samples were elicited at the beginning, middle and end points of the project, analyzed for global, segmental, syllabic, prosodic and temporal aspects of L2 pronunciation, and linked to their aptitude and experience profiles. Results indicated that the participants generally enhanced the global comprehensibility of their speech (via reducing vowel insertion errors in complex syllables) as a function of increased classroom experience during their first semester, and explicit learning aptitude (associative memory, phonemic coding) appeared to help certain learners further enhance their pronunciation proficiency through the development of fluency and prosody. In the second semester, incidental learning ability (sound sequence recognition) was shown to be a significant predictor of the extent to which certain learners continued to improve and ultimately attain advanced-level L2 comprehensibility, largely thanks to improved segmental accuracy.Adult second language acquisition (SLA) is a multifaceted phenomenon whose process and product are greatly affected not only by factors related to experience (e.g., how second language [L2] learners have practiced the target language), but also by those which are learner-internal (e.g., to what extent they are cognitively and socially adept at L2 pronunciation learning). Adopting a longitudinal approach (i.e., where learners engaged in practice activities inside and outside English-as-a-Foreign-Language (EFL) classrooms over one academic year), the current study examined how 40 college-level Japanese students with various aptitude scores (in terms of sound sequence recognition, phonemic coding, and associative memory) could improve the global 2 Kazuya Saito, Yui Suzukida and Hui Sun (comprehensibility), segmental (consonant/vowel errors), syllabic (schwa vowel insertion), prosodic (wrong/missing stress) and temporal (breakdown, speed, fluency) dimensions of their L2 pronunciation. BACKGROUND

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Temporal Analysesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Temporal Analysesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Aptitude, Experience, and Second Language Pronunciation Proficiency Development in Classroom Settings

Saito

Suzukida

Sun

2018

Stud Second Lang Acquis

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“…However, more recent accounts which looked more closely at the nature of the relationship between L1 and L2 fluency suggest that reliable L2 fluency measures should be corrected to accommodate baseline, temporal characteristics of L1 as the temporal characteristics of a speaker's L2 output are a function of their idiosyncratic way of speaking as well as the degree of automatisation of L2 processing. (De Jong et al, 2012;Derwing, Munro, Thomson, & Rossiter, 2009;Osborne, 2007;Segalowitz, 2010). This paper investigates the relationship between L1 and L2 fluency and the claim that they should be considered in conjunction.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Establishing the fluency gap between native and non-native-speech

Guz

2015

RiL

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Although various dimensions of speech fluency have so far generated a great deal of research interest, very few accounts have tackled the issue of the relationship between L1 and L2 fluency. Also, little empirical evidence has been provided to support the claim that language users are more fluent in their mother tongue than in a foreign/second language. This study examines the fluency gap between L1 and L2 fluency using a battery of objectively quantifiable temporal measures of speed and breakdown fluency. It also attempts to identify those temporal fluency variables which are affected by the individual way of speaking rather than the degree of automatisation of speech processing and which underlie oral performance both in L1 and L2. The analysis draws on transcriptions of elicited speech samples in L1 (Polish) and L2 (English).

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“…As regards the pause annotation procedure, we followed a well-established research tradition (see Goldman-Eisler 1968;Towell, Hawkins and Bazergui 1996;Freed et al 2004;Segalowitz and Freed 2004;Wood 2006;de Jong et al 2012), where a pause is defined as a silence or a non-verbal filler of 0.25 seconds or longer. A visual representation was produced for each sample using PRAAT software (Boersma and Weenink 2005) to indicate pause boundaries and identify their duration.…”

Section: Measuring Utterance Fluencymentioning

confidence: 99%

Formulaic Sequences as Fluency Devices in the Oral Production of Native Speakers of Polish

Guz

2014

RiL

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In this paper we attempt to determine the nature and strength of the relationship between the use of formulaic sequences and productive fluency of native speakers of Polish. In particular, we seek to validate the claim that speech characterized by a higher incidence of formulaic sequences is produced more rapidly and with fewer hesitation phenomena. The analysis is based on monologic speeches delivered by 45 speakers of L1 Polish. The data include both the recordings and their transcriptions annotated for a number of objective fluency measures. In the first part of the study the total of formulaic sequences is established for each sample. This is followed by determining a set of temporal measures of the speakers' output (speech rate, articulation rate, mean length of runs, mean length of pauses, phonation time ratio). The study provides some preliminary evidence of the fluency-enhancing role of formulaic language. Our results show that the use of formulaic sequences is positively and significantly correlated with speech rate, mean length of runs and phonation time ratio. This suggests that a higher concentration of formulaic material in output is associated with faster speed of speech, longer stretches of speech between pauses and an increased amount of time filled with speech.

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The effect of task complexity on functional adequacy, fluency and lexical diversity in speaking performances of native and non-native speakers

Cited by 55 publications

References 0 publications

Aptitude, Experience, and Second Language Pronunciation Proficiency Development in Classroom Settings

Aptitude, Experience, and Second Language Pronunciation Proficiency Development in Classroom Settings

Establishing the fluency gap between native and non-native-speech

Formulaic Sequences as Fluency Devices in the Oral Production of Native Speakers of Polish

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