The effect of L2 immersion on English stress perception and production by Korean learners
Hijo Kang (Chosun University)
Hyun-ju Kim (SUNY Korea)
Abstract
This study examines the development patterns for English stress of Korean learners to investigate how their strategies for English stress production and perception differ depending on their learning environment. The objective of the current study is to provide a more comprehensive understanding of English stress acquisition of Korean learners by comparing those with L2 immersion (ESL learners) to those without L2 immersion (EFL learners). For this purpose, we analyzed the results of the production and perception experiments using two types of statistical methods: Mixed Effect Regression (MER) and Primary Component Analysis (PCA). The results suggest that Korean learners of English mainly adopt duration and intensity in their production and pitch in their perception of English stress. However, ESL learners were distinct from EFL learners, more native-like in utilizing duration and intensity. These findings indicate that ESL learners more closely resemble native speakers than EFL learners, although their perception and production development were asynchronous and different from those of the native group; their use of the phonetic cues for English stress were more native-like in production than in perception. This suggests a somewhat positive but limited effect of immersion, which could be due to the immersion period, which was about a year. In addition, the statistical analyses using PCA provide insight into the understanding of overall L2 stress development by addressing relative contributions of acoustic features to English stress.
Keywords
English stress, immersion, perception, production, proficiency level, Primary Component Analysis