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Paola Escudero, Jelle Kastelein & Klara Weiand University of Amsterdam

The effect of first language & proficiency in the perception of Dutch vowels by Spanish & Portuguese learners of Dutch. Paola Escudero, Jelle Kastelein & Klara Weiand University of Amsterdam. Spanish vs. Dutch vowels. Portuguese vs. Dutch vowels. Spanish vs. Portuguese. Listeners.

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Paola Escudero, Jelle Kastelein & Klara Weiand University of Amsterdam

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  1. The effect of first language & proficiency in the perception of Dutch vowels by Spanish & Portuguese learners of Dutch Paola Escudero, Jelle Kastelein & Klara Weiand University of Amsterdam

  2. Spanish vs. Dutch vowels

  3. Portuguese vs. Dutch vowels

  4. Spanish vs. Portuguese

  5. Listeners • 41 Latin American learners of Dutch • 23 European Spanish learners of Dutch • 22 Brazilian learners of Dutch • 22 adult Dutch natives • Different proficiency levels according to the EU measure of language proficiency

  6. Predictions for perception • Portuguese learners may be better at classifying Dutch vowels because of their number of vowels and similarity in acoustic values • However, if both learners are influenced by orthographic mismatches between Dutch and their native orthography, they could have equal performance • In general, advanced learners will be better than beginners

  7. Vowel categorization task

  8. L1-L2 orthography Dutch /i/ <ie> Spanish & Portuguese /je/ Dutch /I/ <i> Spanish & Portuguese /i/ Dutch /u/ <oe> Spanish & Portuguese /oe/ Dutch /Y/ <u> Spanish & Portuguese /u/

  9. 113 synthetic stimuli

  10. Analysis • We measured the listeners’ perceptual space, i.e. the distance between the F1 & F2 values which they categorized as the 12 Dutch vowels • We first compute the variation for the perception of each vowel • Then, we calculated the distances between the mean perception of the Dutch central vowel /O/ and the mean perception of the other 11vowels • Here we present the variation and distances for the corner vowels /a/, /i/ and /u/

  11. Beginning Dutch learners compared to Dutch natives Dutch: Solid line Learner: Dotted line

  12. Latin American Spanish

  13. European Spanish

  14. Brazilian Portuguese

  15. Predictions borne out? • Test: Each group compared to the natives. Wilcoxon paired ranked tests on 11 differences between vowel centres and the vowel /O/ • Result: All three groups are significantly different from the natives • Comparisons between pairs of learners’ groups do not reach significance • Orthography may be the explanation

  16. Advanced Dutch learners compared to Dutch natives Dutch: Solid line Learner: Dashed line

  17. Latin American Spanish

  18. European Spanish

  19. Brazilian Portuguese

  20. Predictions borne out? • Comparisons between each learners group and the natives yield a significant difference only for the Spanish groups • Comparisons between the Spanish groups and the Brazilian were also significantly different • Brazilians are by far the best • The acoustic similarity between BP and Dutch vowels may be responsible

  21. L2 development? • Advanced in all three groups significantly different from beginners • How about longitudinal development?

  22. Preliminary analysis of longitudinal data (two session, one year apart)

  23. L2 proficiency & longitudinal data • Almost all learners increased their general comprehension in Dutch in one year, or kept their proficiency if they were advanced learners • Unfortunately, only 25 LAS, 14 BP and 9 ES returned for the 2nd session. • Thus, we decided to examine the general development per language group • Prediction: If perceptual development correlates with general comprehension, performance in the 2nd session should be better than in the 1st.

  24. Preliminary analysis of longitudinal data Dutch: Solid line First session: Dotted line Second session: Dashed line (after one year)

  25. Longitudinal LAS

  26. Longitudinal ES

  27. Longitudinal BP

  28. Results + discussion • No development, apparently • Session comparisons do not yield significant difference for neither of the three groups • All three groups are significantly different from the natives in both sessions • Different proficiencies in groups, small Ns • No correlation between the development of general comprehension & perception • Further research: Individual development

  29. Conclusions • Brazilian and Spanish equally different from Dutch as beginners = L1-L2 orthographic mismatch • Only advanced Brazilians reach native-like proficiency = L1-L2 acoustic/perceptual similarity • No group longitudinal development = either perceptual development takes more than a year or average performance is not an accurate measure • Important: Examine individual learner variation

  30. Theoretical/formal modelling • Can we explain these L2 perception patterns? • In our next talk, we present three different frameworks for modelling these data: Two machine learning, one computational linguistic • We will show the modelling techniques and how the frameworks handle the data

  31. Acknowledgements: Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research Research assistants: Jeannette Elsenburg, Annemarieke Samason, Titia Benders, Marieke Gerrits email: escudero@uva.nl

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