Research

High Variability Phonetic Training (HVPT)

My dissertation examines HVPT, which exposes learners to diverse speaker pronunciations, enhancing their perception and production of non-native contrasts beyond the instructor's input.

 

Overview:

  • Participants: 74 Spanish beginners.

  • Training: Focused on stop consonants over one semester and 20 sessions. 

  • Results: Significant improvement in perception as training sessions progressed.

VOT Contrast Between English and Spanish

  • English Voiceless Stops (/p/, /t/, /k/): Longer VOT, up to 59ms.

  • Spanish Voiceless Stops: Shorter VOT, typically 0-30ms.

 

Training Results

  • Before HVPT: Students' VOT averaged 58ms (left image), reflecting English-like aspiration.

  • After HVPT: VOT decreased to 11ms (right image), showing improved alignment with native Spanish pronunciation.

Takeaway / Practical Applications:

HVPT can be implemented in any language course as a complementary activity to improve production and perception.  It only takes 10–15 minutes per session and can be done at home.

My dissertation also analyzes phonetic drift, an area with limited research on how learning a second language influences the phonetics of one's native language.

For more information, feel free to contact me.

 

 

 

In Press Accepted Publications.

 

 

 

Andreu Rascón, I. (2024). Segmenting Speech: The Role of Resyllabification in Spanish Phonology. Languages. Accepted for publication (Under review).

 

 

Speech Segmentation in Bilingual Speakers

  • Natural Segmentation: Humans segment speech using transitional probabilities between linguistic elements.

  • Bilingual Challenge: L1 influences L2 perception, leading to transfer effects based on phonological similarities/differences.

Study Goals

  • Investigate how resyllabification and consonant duration impact speech segmentation in native Spanish speakers and L2 learners.

  • Explore the role of visual and auditory cues in perceiving resyllabified utterances and durational differences.

  • Assess how proficiency affects L2 learners' ability to detect and segment speech based on durational cues.

Resyllabification in Spanish

 

  • Concept: Consonants at syllable/word boundaries shift to the next syllable onset, causing perceptual ambiguities.
  • Debate: Focuses on duration differences between canonical and resyllabified forms.
  • Example: 'Busca socio' vs. 'Buscas ocio' ([bus.ka.so.sjo]).
  • Comparison: Spanish avoids vowel-initial syllables; English often uses glottalization.

 

Methodology

 

  • Data: 26 sentences from 10 speakers.
  • Participants: 80 native Spanish speakers, 195 L2 learners.
  • Proficiency: Assessed with LexTALE.
  • Testing Conditions: Audio-only, visual-only, and audiovisual.
  • Focus: Segmentation accuracy of /n/ and /s/.
  • Analysis: Binomial logistic regression on proficiency, consonant type, and presentation mode.

Results

 

  • Speech Segmentation: Both native Spanish speakers and L2 learners could segment speech accurately in canonical and resyllabified contexts.

  • Audiovisual Cues:  Yielded the highest segmentation accuracy for all participants.

  • Native vs. L2 Learners: Native speakers performed more consistently, while L2 learners showed greater variability based on proficiency (more spread).
  • Aural Segmentation: Acquired at early proficiency stages for L2 learners.
  • Visual Segmentation: Developed at higher proficiency levels, with native speakers benefiting less from visual-only cues.

Andreu Rascón, I., & Casillas, J. V. (2024). Visual Cues in Language Learning: Vowel Perception in L2 Learners. International Journal of Bilingualism. Accepted for publication (under review).

Objective: Explore how English speakers learning Spanish perceive Spanish vowels using both visual and auditory cues.

 

 

Methodology

  • Participants: 169 English-speaking learners from U.S. institutions and Spanish centers.

  • Proficiency: Assessed with LexTALE.

  • Stimuli: Bisyllabic non-words presented in four conditions:

    • Audio-only

    • Visual-only

    • Audiovisual

    • Mismatch (created by maintaing the original visual articulation and selecting audio input from the opposite point of articulation).

 

Results:

Audio-Only Condition:

  • Vowel Differentiation Challenges: Lower proficiency students struggled to distinguish vowels with the same place of articulation (e.g., /u/ vs. /o/). Increased proficiency reduced this confusion.

Audiovisual Condition:

  • Enhanced Vowel Identification: The addition of visual cues improved accuracy.

Visual-Only Condition:

  • Vowel Confusion Among Similar Pairs: Lower proficiency learners confused visually and articulatorily similar vowels, such as /e/ vs. /i/ and /u/ vs. /o/.

  • Proficiency-Related Improvements: Higher proficiency students demonstrated greater accuracy in visual vowel identification.

Mismatch Condition (Incongruent Audio-Visual Information):

  • Auditory Cue Reliance in Lower Proficiency: Less proficient learners predominantly relied on auditory information when audio and visual cues were incongruent.

  • Visual Cue Prioritization in Higher Proficiency: More proficient students prioritized visual information, suggesting the development of robust visual vowel categories.

Other publications:

  • Andreu Rascón, I. (2024). Segmenting speech: The role of resyllabification in Spanish phonology. Languages, 9(11), Article 346. https://doi.org/10.3390/languages9110346
  • Casillas, J. V., Garrido-Pozú, J. J., Parrish, K., Arroyo, L. F., Andreu Rascón, I., & Taveras, K. (2023). Using Intonation to Disambiguate Meaning: The role of Empathy and Proficiency in L2 Perceptual Development. Applied Psycholinguistics, 44(5), 913-940. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0142716423000310
  • Casillas, J. V., Constantin-Dureci, G., Rascón Andreu, I., A., Gadamsetty, A., Minetti, A., Laungani, K., Thatcher, J., Gardere, R.-T., Taveras, K., Chang, I., Rodríguez, N., & Parrish, K. (2023). Opening science to all: Demystifying reproducibility and transparency practices in linguistic research. Manuscript accepted for publication in Linguistics: An Interdisciplinary Journal of the Language Sciences. Preprint DOI: https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/spz4w

 

In preparation:

  • Andreu Rascón, I. Enhancing Perception of Spanish Voiced and Voiceless Stops Through High Variability Phonetic Training.
  • Andreu Rascón, I. The Impact of Phonetic Training on Perception of Stop Consonant Continuums.
  • Andreu Rascón, I. Phonetic Drift in Second Language Acquisition: The Case of Spanish Stop Consonants.