Turning an L1 threeway contrast into an L2 twoway contrast

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Turning an L1 three-way contrast into an L2
two-way contrast
Paola Escudero University of Utrecht and McGill
University Paul Boersma University of
Amsterdam Second International Conference on
Contrast in Phonology Toronto, May 3, 2002
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Introduction

• Learning an L2 two-way contrast is problematic if
  it has an L1 three-way contrast as a starting
  point.
• The initial state of L2 speech comprehension
  provides evidence of an intermediate perceptual
  level.
• The perception of L2 learners improves during
  development.
• L2 perceptual development need not affect L1
  performance.

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Casethe perception of front vowels by Dutch
learners of Spanish
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L1 and L2 production environments
Dutch
Spanish
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Foreign-language perception
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Transfer for beginners in identification
L1 L2

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Evidence for an intermediate discrete perception
level

• target-language /i/ associated with L1 /i/
• target-language /e/ identified with L1 /?/
• (/I/ ? i identification task reflects
  recognition)

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L1 and L2 production environments
Dutch
Spanish
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L2 perception improves
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L1 perception stays good
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Perception modes

• The model requires that L2 boundaries can shift
  without affecting L1 perception.
• Therefore, we must assume separate perception
  grammars for L1 and L2 within every single
  speaker.
• Is there independent evidence for such a
  distinction? Set up the two alleged modes by
  language-dependent priming, then compare L1
  classification in the two modes.

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Beginning Dutch learners of Spanish
Mode Dutch Spanish
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Intermediate Dutch learners of Spanish
Mode Dutch Spanish
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Advanced Dutch learners of Spanish
Mode Dutch Spanish
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Bilingual Dutch-Spanish
Mode Dutch Spanish
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Formalization OT constraints

• an F1 of 200 Hz is not /a/
• an F1 of 200 Hz is not /E/
• an F1 of 200 Hz is not /I/
• an F1 of 200 Hz is not /i/
• an F1 of 450 Hz is not /a/
• an F1 of 1000 Hz is not /a/
• ...

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How OT handles perception
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L1 perception if theres a lexicon

• Recognition phase undoes misperceptions.

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How recognition mismatches change the rankings in
the perception grammar
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L1 computer simulation

• Initial state all constraints ranked equally
  high.
• Learner hears 1000 tokens/month, drawn from the
  Dutch F1 distribution. Learner is also told (by
  recognition) which was the correct category.
• Stochastic OT, evaluation noise 2.0.
• Plasticity (size of the learning steps) starts
  at 10.0 (much larger than the evaluation noise)
  decreases by 3 every month ends at 0.014 after
  18 years. ? First fast, then accurate.

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Dutch production environment(short front vowels
and /?/)
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Final L1 state
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L2 computer simulation

• Initial state final state of L1.
• Learner hears 500 tokens/month, drawn from the
  Spanish F1 distribution. Learner is also told
  (by recognition) which was the correct category
  (/A/, /E/, /i/ never /I/).
• Stochastic OT, evaluation noise 2.0.
• Plasticity (size of the learning steps) stays
  constant at 0.01 ? slow but accurate.

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Initial L2 state (full transfer)
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Conclusions

• The transfer of an L1 3-way contrast is
  problematic if the TL has a 2-way contrast.
• Theres a perceptual level with discrete
  categories.
• Learners improve their L2 perception (full
  access) without affecting their L1 performance
  (separate perception modes).
• For the time being, the only linguistic framework
  that models this is OT with GLA.

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Opposite claims

• L2 perception can hardly be learned(Pallier,
  Bosch Sebastián-Gallés 1997)

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Not in Palliers article

• The individual data show a bimodal distribution
  that was averaged

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Palliers dataactually confirmthat L2 learners
can become proficient
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Opposite claims

• There is only one perception mode L1 (Pallier,
  Bosch Sebastián-Gallés 1997)

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Not in Palliers article

• The individual data confirm two modes

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Palliers dataactually confirmthe two
perception modes
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Conclusions still valid...

• The transfer of an L1 3-way contrast is
  problematic if the TL has a 2-way contrast.
• Theres a perceptual level with discrete
  categories.
• Learners improve their L2 perception (full
  access) without affecting their L1 performance
  (separate perception modes).
• For the time being, the only linguistic framework
  that models this is OT with GLA.

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atención!Thank you for your attention!