Iowa State University Capstones, Theses and Graduate Theses and Dissertations Dissertations 2014 The effectiveness of linking instruction on NNS speech perception and production Ghinwa Alameen Iowa State University Follow this and additional works at: https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/etd Part of the Bilingual, Multilingual, and Multicultural Education Commons, and the Linguistics Commons Recommended Citation Alameen, Ghinwa, "The effectiveness of linking instruction on NNS speech perception and production" (2014). Graduate Theses and Dissertations. 14004. https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/etd/14004 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Iowa State University Capstones, Theses and Dissertations at Iowa State University Digital Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Graduate Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Iowa State University Digital Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The effectiveness of linking instruction on NNS speech perception and production by Ghinwa Alameen A dissertation submitted to the graduate faculty in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Major: Applied Linguistics and Technology Program of Study Committee: John M. Levis, Major Professor Janet Anderson-Hsieh Bethany E. Gray Donna M. Niday Tammy Slater Horabail Venkatagiri Iowa State University Ames, Iowa 2014 Copyright © Ghinwa Alameen, 2014. All rights reserved. ii To Haifa and Marwan To Syria.. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES ......................................................................................................... vi LIST OF TABLES .......................................................................................................... vii NOMENCLATURE ......................................................................................................... ix ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................................................................. x ABSTRACT ...................................................................................................................... ix CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION ................................................................................... 1 Statement of the Problem .............................................................................................. 3 Purpose of the Study ..................................................................................................... 4 Research Questions ....................................................................................................... 5 Significance of the Study .............................................................................................. 6 Organization of the Dissertation ................................................................................... 6 CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW ...................................................................... 8 Connected Speech Processes ........................................................................................ 8 Connected speech features ...................................................................................... 9 Linking ........................................................................................................................ 12 Definition of linking ............................................................................................. 12 Types of linking .................................................................................................... 13 Connected Speech Perception ..................................................................................... 15 Speech segmentation ............................................................................................. 16 Effects of CSPs on listening perception and comprehension ............................... 17 Effectiveness of CSP perceptual training on listening .......................................... 18 Connected Speech Production .................................................................................... 25 Connected speech in NS and NNS production ..................................................... 25 Effectiveness of CSP instruction on L2 production .............................................. 26 The Effect of Word Frequency ................................................................................... 28 Electronic Visual Feedback ........................................................................................ 30 Types of electronic visual feedback ...................................................................... 30 Using waveforms in teaching linking ................................................................... 34 EVF software ........................................................................................................ 36 Advantages and limitations of EVF ...................................................................... 37 Guidelines for using EVF ..................................................................................... 38 Effectiveness of EVF on L2 pronunciation .......................................................... 40 Student perspectives on using EVF ...................................................................... 42 Chapter Summary ....................................................................................................... 43 CHAPTER III: METHODS .......................................................................................... 44 Research Design.......................................................................................................... 44 Participants and Setting Description ........................................................................... 46 iv Procedures ................................................................................................................... 48 Training materials ................................................................................................. 49 Chapter Summary ....................................................................................................... 57 CHAPTER IV: THE EFFECTIVENESS OF LINKING INSTRUCTION ON PERCEPTION ......................................................................................................... 58 Materials ..................................................................................................................... 58 Perception tests ..................................................................................................... 58 Perception Test Stimuli ......................................................................................... 59 Analysis....................................................................................................................... 59 Results ......................................................................................................................... 61 Research question 1: The effectiveness of training .............................................. 62 Research question 2: The long-term effects of training ........................................ 63 Research question 3: Transfer to novel contexts .................................................. 66 Discussion ................................................................................................................... 68 Research question 1: The effectiveness of training .............................................. 68 Research question 2: The long-term effects of training ........................................ 73 Research question 3: Transfer to novel contexts .................................................. 74 Chapter Summary ....................................................................................................... 75 CHAPTER V: THE EFFECTIVENESS OF LINKING INSTRUCTION ON PRODUCTION ........................................................................................................ 76 Materials ..................................................................................................................... 76 Production tests ..................................................................................................... 76 Production tests stimuli ......................................................................................... 77 Analysis....................................................................................................................... 79 Preparing production data ..................................................................................... 79 Rating criteria: Revisiting the definition of linking .............................................. 79 Second rater training ............................................................................................. 80 Production analysis procedure .............................................................................. 81 Results ......................................................................................................................... 83 Research question 1: The effectiveness of training .............................................. 83 Research question 2: The long-term effects of training ........................................ 85 Research question 3: Transfer to novel contexts .................................................. 88 Research question 4: The effect of word frequency ............................................. 90 Discussion ..................................................................................................................