The Perception of Phonological Quantity based on Durational Cues by Native Speakers, Second-language Users and Nonspeakers of Finnish

Abstract

Some languages, such as Finnish, use speech-sound duration as the primary cue for a phonological quantity distinction. For second-language (L2) learners, quantity is often difficult to master if speech-sound duration plays a less important role in the phonology of their native language (L1). By comparing the categorization performance of native speakers of Finnish, Russian L2 users of Finnish, and non-Finnish-speaking Russians, the present study aimed to determine whether the L2 users, whose native language does not have a quantity distinction, have been able to establish categories for Finnish quantity. The results suggest that the native speakers and some of the L2 users that have been exposed to Finnish for a longer time have access to phonological quantity categories, whereas the L2 users with shorter exposure and the non-Finnish-speaking subjects do not. In addition, by comparing categorization and discrimination tasks it was found that the native speakers show a phoneme-boundary effect for quantity that is cued by duration only, whereas the non-Finnish-speaking subjects and the subjects with low proficiency in Finnish do not.

The relationship between native allophonic experience with vowel duration and perception of the English tense/lax vowel contrast by Spanish and Russian listeners

“…In this case, the present data must be interpreted as Russian listeners' assimilating ͓i͔ to a longer ͑stressed͒ category, and ͓(͔ to a shorter one ͑per-haps prestressed͒, in a pattern of two-category assimilation ͑Best, 1995͒. A similar explanation has been advanced by Ylinen et al ͑2005͒ to explain monolingual Russian listeners' treatment of the Finnish vowel length contrast. This interpretation is also consistent with the observed lack of a significant correlation found between the results of experiments 1 and 2.…”

“…The structure of the practice session was identical to the actual experiment but responses were not recorded. proficiency and the relative weighting given to spectrum versus duration ͑Piske et al, 2001;McAllister et al, 2002;Ylinen et al, 2005͒. Factors ͑predictor variables͒ were ͑see Table I͒: ͑1͒ age of participant, ͑2͒ age of arrival ͑AOA͒ in the USA, ͑3͒ length of residency ͑LOR͒ in the USA, ͑4͒ age of starting English as a foreign language ͑EFL͒ education in the home country, ͑5͒ period of EFL in the home country, ͑6͒ period of English as a second language ͑ESL͒ study in the USA after arrival, ͑7͒ age of starting formal education in the USA, ͑8͒ period of formal education in the USA, ͑9͒ self-estimated degree of motivation in using ESL, ͑10͒ self-estimated degree of imitation abilities, ͑11͒ self-estimated degree of using ESL at home, ͑12͒ self-estimated degree of using ESL in a social environment, and ͑13͒ self-estimated degree of using ESL at work.…”

“…Although no independent test for English language proficiency was employed in the present study, we analyzed 13 factors ͑see Table I͒ known to affect degree of foreign accent in L2 and that are used widely in the literature to estimate foreign language proficiency ͑Piske et McAllister et al, 2002;Ylinen et al, 2005͒. The two groups ͑Spanish and Russian͒ did not differ from one another according to 12 of the 13 measured variables suggesting that the two groups were well matched in terms of English proficiency.…”

Evidence from auditory and visual event-related potential (ERP) studies of deviance detection (MMN and vMMN) linking predictive coding theories and perceptual object representations

“…MMN effects corresponding to the category-boundary (Liberman et al, 1957) as well as to the perceptual magnet effect (Kuhl, 1991) have been observed. With many studies using cross-linguistic controls, across-category contrasts yielded higher-amplitude and/or earlier MMN responses than withincategory ones (Dehaene-Lambertz, 1997;Näätänen et al, 1997;Phillips et al, 2000;Winkler et al, 1999;Ylinen et al, 2005). Further, near-prototype contrasts elicited lower-amplitude MMNs than within-category contrasts between less typical pairs having equal acoustic separation (Aaltonen et al, 1997).…”

Learning to read for the first time as adult immigrants in Finland

“…Previous research has found the Finnish quantity feature to be difficult to perceive, produce and spell for both literate L2 Finnish learners (see Nenonen et al, 2003;Ullakonoja, Kuronen, Hurme, & Dufva, 2014;Ylinen, Shestakova, Alku, & Huotilainen, 2005) as well as pre-literate and low-literate L2 Finnish learners (Heikkinen, 2009;Malessa, 2016). Heikkinen (2009, p. 49) found in her study that LESLLA learners struggled with the quantity distinction of both double vowels and geminates and revealed that most quantity errors concerned the distinction between /k/ -/kk/ and/v/ -/vv/.…”