Communicative Pressure and Missing Surface Phonological Features
Pajunen, Mikko (2023)
Pajunen, Mikko
2023
Kielten maisteriohjelma - Master's Programme in Languages
Informaatioteknologian ja viestinnän tiedekunta - Faculty of Information Technology and Communication Sciences
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Hyväksymispäivämäärä
2023-03-30
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-202303132907
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-202303132907
Tiivistelmä
The manner in which communicative pressure may cause variable forms in speech is occasionally discussed in L2 research. However, the discussion has been limited mostly to syntax and morphology, and what has remained largely unexplored is the way communicative pressure and cognitive processing limitations may affect phonological surface forms. Accordingly, L2 speaker phonology warrants investigation in this framework since phonology, much like morphology and syntax, similarly consists of organized and structured representations.
This thesis explores phonological optionality with consideration to cognitive processing limitations in L2 speech production. The presented investigation is a pilot study that tests a research design by which individuals are observed realizing their L2 phonology differently in two contexts: one which involves communicative pressure and one which does not. The hypothesis is that communicative pressure (i.e., situations involving “online” speech production) sets limits to working memory, temporarily making phonological features in specific categories inaccessible, resulting in non-target pronunciation. The pronunciation, it is hypothesized, becomes more target-like once the communicative pressure variable is removed.
Finnish university students undergoing language teacher training were recruited to the study and recorded during their practice lessons in which the language of communication was English. Based on several hours of classroom audio data, the participants’ pronunciation was evaluated and tokens of non-target pronunciation in specific words were selected as stimuli for the study’s second phase, which involved a recorded elicitation task. In addition to the elicitation task, the participants completed a receptive task based on the same stimuli. Both tasks were tailored to each participant as the stimuli were based on each participant’s phonological performance as observed in the classroom.
The methods used in this study are qualitative, involving formant analyses with spectrographic and waveform illustrations conducted on the elicitation task audio data. The participants were additionally interviewed about their speech attitudes and strategies regarding L2 English. Specifically, the tokens analyzed in this study involved sibilant and plosive-sibilant clusters with phonation as a variable, lateral approximants with either velarized or non-velarized allophone as a variable, dental fricatives as part of assimilatory processes at word boundaries, L-vocalization in syllable rhymes, and word-final plosives with either presence or absence of release burst as a variable.
The results of the analysis may be summarized as follows: the study participants realized the allophone or phoneme that is closer to target language norms in the experimental situation in which communicative pressure was absent. They also judged the target-like version token as more correct than the non-target version in the receptive task. However, this finding did not replicate for all tokens. The validity of the investigated phonological features in addition to other methodological features of the study are assessed in the concluding chapters.
The findings are interpreted to mean that the classroom context, in which the participants were initially observed, involves communicative pressure, explaining why phonological performance errors were more frequent in the classroom than in the experimental context. Based on earlier work on morphological and syntactic categories, it is suggested that working memory may become burdened by, for instance, psychological stress, resulting in the target phonological features, which are underlyingly represented, being temporarily unrealized in the phonological surface representations of L2 speakers.
This thesis explores phonological optionality with consideration to cognitive processing limitations in L2 speech production. The presented investigation is a pilot study that tests a research design by which individuals are observed realizing their L2 phonology differently in two contexts: one which involves communicative pressure and one which does not. The hypothesis is that communicative pressure (i.e., situations involving “online” speech production) sets limits to working memory, temporarily making phonological features in specific categories inaccessible, resulting in non-target pronunciation. The pronunciation, it is hypothesized, becomes more target-like once the communicative pressure variable is removed.
Finnish university students undergoing language teacher training were recruited to the study and recorded during their practice lessons in which the language of communication was English. Based on several hours of classroom audio data, the participants’ pronunciation was evaluated and tokens of non-target pronunciation in specific words were selected as stimuli for the study’s second phase, which involved a recorded elicitation task. In addition to the elicitation task, the participants completed a receptive task based on the same stimuli. Both tasks were tailored to each participant as the stimuli were based on each participant’s phonological performance as observed in the classroom.
The methods used in this study are qualitative, involving formant analyses with spectrographic and waveform illustrations conducted on the elicitation task audio data. The participants were additionally interviewed about their speech attitudes and strategies regarding L2 English. Specifically, the tokens analyzed in this study involved sibilant and plosive-sibilant clusters with phonation as a variable, lateral approximants with either velarized or non-velarized allophone as a variable, dental fricatives as part of assimilatory processes at word boundaries, L-vocalization in syllable rhymes, and word-final plosives with either presence or absence of release burst as a variable.
The results of the analysis may be summarized as follows: the study participants realized the allophone or phoneme that is closer to target language norms in the experimental situation in which communicative pressure was absent. They also judged the target-like version token as more correct than the non-target version in the receptive task. However, this finding did not replicate for all tokens. The validity of the investigated phonological features in addition to other methodological features of the study are assessed in the concluding chapters.
The findings are interpreted to mean that the classroom context, in which the participants were initially observed, involves communicative pressure, explaining why phonological performance errors were more frequent in the classroom than in the experimental context. Based on earlier work on morphological and syntactic categories, it is suggested that working memory may become burdened by, for instance, psychological stress, resulting in the target phonological features, which are underlyingly represented, being temporarily unrealized in the phonological surface representations of L2 speakers.