Grants and Contributions:

Grant or Award spanning more than one fiscal year. (2017-2018 to 2022-2023)

The ability to master a second language at a high level of proficiency is a challenging task, particularly if attempted as an adult. Rarely do late second language learners attain native-like performance, particularly in the areas of speech production and perception. The reasons why certain individuals achieve better ultimate phonetic attainment than others and the means by which they do so remain unresolved. The major objective of the proposed research is to examine the factors that underlie individual differences in phonetic proficiency in bilingual speakers who have acquired their L2 at different ages and in different contexts. Through careful analysis of the background characteristics of participants, as well as fine-grained comparisons of articulatory-phonetic and prosodic parameters in the speakers’ L1 and L2, we will identify some of the factors that contribute to successful L2 speech motor and perceptual learning. The long-term goals include development of a model of bilingual speech production that addresses the myriad influences on phonetic attainment and their relative contributions.
Acoustic analyses have recently demonstrated that individual characteristics of native language (L1) speech production affect production in L2 (e.g., Kartushina & Frauenfelder, 2014). Identifying how specific L1 articulatory configurations may affect L2 can only be determined through kinematic measures (e.g., Tiede et al.; Wieling et al.), as proposed here. A second focus of the proposed research is the processing of speech prosody (e.g, Gilbert et al., 2016a, b). Following Chung & Bidelman (2016), we will use ERPs to examine whether French-English bilinguals of varying proficiency levels demonstrate reduced mismatch negativity responses (MMNs) to incorrect stress patterns in pseudowords, suggesting differential sensitivity to stress violations across listener groups.
A third set of studies will focus on the phonetics-lexical interface. In monolinguals, investigators have shown sensitivity to low-level manipulations of acoustic cues (e.g., VOT) in activating lexical representations (e.g., Andruski et al., 1994; McMurray et al., 2002). In bilinguals whose two languages rely on different prototypical VOTs to define voicing contrasts, it is not clear whether their L1 phonetic system may interfere with such sensitivity or whether, depending on L2 proficiency, among other individual characteristics, (late) L2 speakers demonstrate comparable sensitivity to monolinguals or simultaneous bilinguals, suggesting that they maintain truly independent phonetic systems.
The proposed investigations will shed light on the factors that influence ultimate attainment in second language speech processing and the speech processing traits that characterize native-like production and perception.