{"title":"Improving Second Language Vowel Production With Hand Gestures Encoding Visible Articulation: Evidence From Picture‐Naming and Paragraph‐Reading Tasks","authors":"Xiaotong Xi, Peng Li, Pilar Prieto","doi":"10.1111/lang.12647","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"This study investigates whether audiovisual phonetic training with hand gestures encoding visible or nonvisible articulation features has a differential impact on learning second language sounds. Ninety‐nine Catalan–Spanish bilingual students were trained to differentiate English /æ/ and /ʌ/, which differ in the visible lip aperture and nonvisible tongue position, with training involving no gestures, gestures representing the lip aperture, or gestures representing the tongue position. Before, immediately after, and 1 week after the training, participants’ perception of the targets was assessed through a word‐identification task, and their production was tested through paragraph‐reading, picture‐naming, and word‐imitation tasks. Although all participants improved in perception and production, the lip hand gesture was more effective in adjusting lip aperture than the other two conditions in the paragraph‐reading and picture‐naming tasks. These results suggest that hand gestures encoding visible rather than nonvisible articulation features are more effective for improving second language pronunciation.","PeriodicalId":51371,"journal":{"name":"Language Learning","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.5000,"publicationDate":"2024-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Language Learning","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1111/lang.12647","RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"EDUCATION & EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
This study investigates whether audiovisual phonetic training with hand gestures encoding visible or nonvisible articulation features has a differential impact on learning second language sounds. Ninety‐nine Catalan–Spanish bilingual students were trained to differentiate English /æ/ and /ʌ/, which differ in the visible lip aperture and nonvisible tongue position, with training involving no gestures, gestures representing the lip aperture, or gestures representing the tongue position. Before, immediately after, and 1 week after the training, participants’ perception of the targets was assessed through a word‐identification task, and their production was tested through paragraph‐reading, picture‐naming, and word‐imitation tasks. Although all participants improved in perception and production, the lip hand gesture was more effective in adjusting lip aperture than the other two conditions in the paragraph‐reading and picture‐naming tasks. These results suggest that hand gestures encoding visible rather than nonvisible articulation features are more effective for improving second language pronunciation.
期刊介绍:
Language Learning is a scientific journal dedicated to the understanding of language learning broadly defined. It publishes research articles that systematically apply methods of inquiry from disciplines including psychology, linguistics, cognitive science, educational inquiry, neuroscience, ethnography, sociolinguistics, sociology, and anthropology. It is concerned with fundamental theoretical issues in language learning such as child, second, and foreign language acquisition, language education, bilingualism, literacy, language representation in mind and brain, culture, cognition, pragmatics, and intergroup relations. A subscription includes one or two annual supplements, alternating among a volume from the Language Learning Cognitive Neuroscience Series, the Currents in Language Learning Series or the Language Learning Special Issue Series.