Cover not available
Article published In:
25 years of Intelligibility, Comprehensibility and Accentedness
Edited by John M. Levis, Tracey M. Derwing and Murray J. Munro
[Journal of Second Language Pronunciation 6:3] 2020
► pp. 458–482

International intelligibility revisited

L2 realizations of NURSE and TRAP and functional load

ORCID logo | University of Vienna

The Lingua Franca Core (LFC) proposes that NURSE is the only vowel quality important for international intelligibility, yet research findings regarding this issue are mixed. Moreover, it is unclear whether phonetic (rather than phonemic) substitutions of NURSE also affect international intelligibility more negatively than other phonemic vowel substitutions, though this seems unlikely on the basis of considerations of functional load (FL). This study compares the international intelligibility of two vowel substitutions typical of Austrian learners of English: the phonetic replacement of NURSE with a rounded and diphthongized vowel, and the phonemic replacement of TRAP with a vowel close to cardinal [e]. The findings suggest that, contrary to the LFC but in line with FL considerations, the phonetic substitution of NURSE is more intelligible to an international audience than the substitution of TRAP with [e]. However, differences in intelligibility between the two substitutions were largely ‘neutralized’ once contextual support was available.

Keywords: English as a lingua franca (ELF), international intelligibility, Lingua Franca Core (LFC), functional load (FL), TRAP, NURSE
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Method
    • 2.1Participants
      • 2.1.1Speaker
      • 2.1.2Listeners
    • 2.2Speech materials
      • 2.2.1Target words
      • 2.2.2Construction of test sentences
    • 2.3Procedure
  • 3.Results
    • 3.1Effect of word type on intelligibility
    • 3.2Effect of word type X condition on intelligibility
  • 4.Discussion
  • 5.Limitations and suggestions for further research
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 6 October 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/jslp.20012.thi
References
Akaike, H.
(1974) A new look at the statistical model identification. IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, 19 (6), 716–723. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Baayen, R. H.
(2013) Multivariate statistics. In R. J. Podesva & D. Sharma (Eds.), Research methods in linguistics (pp. 337–372). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Bates, D., Maechler, M., Bolker, B., & Walker, S.
(2015) Fitting linear mixed effects models using lme4. Journal of Statistical Software, 67(1), 1–48. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Berger, A.
(2010) German. In R. Walker: Teaching the pronunciation of English as a lingua franca (pp. 107–110). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Brown, A.
(1988) Functional load and the teaching of pronunciation. TESOL Quarterly, 22(4), 593–606. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(1989) Some thoughts on intelligibility. The English Teacher, XVIII1. [URL]
Cambridge University Press
2012 English vocabulary profile. [URL]
Catford, J. C.
1987 “Phonetics and the teaching of pronunciation”. In Morley, Joan (eds.). Current perspectives on pronunciation. Washington, D.C.: Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, 87–100.Google Scholar
Chan, A. Y. W. & Li, D. C. S.
(2000) English and Cantonese phonology in contrast: Explaining Cantonese ESL learners’ English pronunciation problems. Language, Culture and Curriculum, 13(1), 67–85. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cohen, J. W.
(1988) Statistical power analysis for the behavioral sciences (2nd ed.). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Cole, S.
(2002) An investigation of the role of vowel quality in oral interactions between NNSs of English as an international language. Speak Out!, 291, 28–37.Google Scholar
Collins, B.; & Vandenbergen, A.-M.
(2000) Modern English pronunciation: A practical guide for speakers of Dutch. Gent, BE: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Council of Europe
(2018) Common European framework of reference for languages: Learning, teaching assessment (Companion volume with new descriptors). [URL]
Derwing, T. M. & Munro, M. J.
(1997) Accent, intelligibility, and comprehensibility: Evidence from four L1s. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 19(1), 1–16. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2015) Pronunciation fundamentals: Evidence-based perspectives for L2 teaching and research. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Deterding, D.
(2013) Misunderstandings in English as a Lingua Franca: An analysis of ELF interactions in South-East Asia. Berlin: de Gruyter Mouton. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Deterding, D., & Kirkpatrick, A.
(2006) Emerging South-East Asian Englishes and intelligibility. World Englishes, 25(3–4), 391–409. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Garcia, J. M., & Cannito, M. P.
(1996) Influence of verbal and nonverbal contexts on the sentence intelligibility of a speaker with dysarthria. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 39 (4), 750–760. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gureckis, T. M., & Goldstone, R. L.
(2011) Schema. In P. C. Hogan (Ed.), The Cambridge encyclopedia of the language sciences (pp. 725–727). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Jenkins, J.
(2000) The phonology of English as an international language. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Kennedy, S.
(2012) When non-native speakers misunderstand each other: Identifying important aspects of pronunciation. Contact, 38(2), 49–62.Google Scholar
Kim, H., & Billington, R.
(2018) Pronunciation and comprehension in English as a lingua franca communication: Effect of L1 influence in international aviation communication. Applied Linguistics, 39 (2), 135–158. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Komar, S.
(2017) The relationship between the perception and production of four General British vowels by Slovene university students of English. Linguistica, 57 (1), 161–170. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Holm, S.
(1979) A simple sequentially rejective multiple test procedure. Scandinavian Journal of Statistics, 6 (2), 65–70.Google Scholar
Hustad, K. C., & Beukelman, D. R.
(2001) Effects of linguistic cues and stimulus cohesion on intelligibility of severely dysarthric speech. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 441, 497–510. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Laufer, B.
(1998) The development of passive and active vocabulary in a second language: Same or different?. Applied Linguistics, 19(2), 255–271. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Levis, J. M., & Cortes, V.
(2008) Minimal pairs in spoken corpora: Implications for pronunciation assessment and teaching. In C. A. Chapelle, Y. R. Chung & J. Xu (Eds.): Towards adaptive CALL: Natural language processing for diagnostic language assessment (pp. 197–208). Ames, IA: Iowa State University.Google Scholar
Luchini, P. L., & Kennedy, S.
(2013) Exploring sources of phonological unintelligibility in spontaneous speech. International Journal of English and Literature, 4(3), 79–88.Google Scholar
Munro, M. J., & Derwing, T. M.
(1995) Foreign accent, comprehensibility, and intelligibility in the speech of second language learners. Language Learning, 45(1), 73–97. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
O’Connor, J. D.
(1980) Better English pronunciation (2nd ed.). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
O’Neal, G.
(2015) ELF intelligibility: The vowel quality factor. Journal of English as a Lingua Franca, 4(2), 347–358. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Osimk, R.
(2009) Decoding sounds: An experimental approach to intelligibility in ELF. Vienna English Working Papers, 18(1), 64–89.Google Scholar
Pisoni, D. B., & McLennan, C. T.
(2016) Spoken word recognition: Historical roots, current theoretical issues, and some new directions. In G. Hickok & S. L. Small (Eds.). Neurobiology of language (pp. 239–253). Tokio: Academic Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Plonsky, L., & Oswald, F. L.
(2014) How big is “big”? Interpreting effect sizes in L2 research. Language Learning, 64(4), 878–912. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Richter, K.
(2019) English-medium instruction and pronunciation: Exposure and skills development. Bristol: Multilingual Matters. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Sewell, A.
(2017) Functional load revisited: Reinterpreting the findings of ‘lingua franca’ intelligibility studies. Journal of Second Language Pronunciation, 3(1), 57–79. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Thir, Veronika
in press). “The role of co-textual and contextual cues for intelligibility in ELF interactions”. In A. Mauranen & S. Vetchinnikova Eds. Language change the impact of English as a Lingua Franca Cambridge Cambridge University Press
Trofimovich, P., Isaacs, T., Kennedy, S., Saito, K., & Crowther, D.
(2016) Flawed self-assessment: Investigating self- and other-perception of second language speech. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 19(1), 122–140. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Walker, R.
(2010) Teaching the pronunciation of English as a lingua franca. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Wells, J. C.
(2008) Longman pronunciation dictionary (3rd ed.). Harlow, UK: Pearson Education Longman.Google Scholar
Widdowson, H. G.
(2004) Text, context, pretext: Critical issues in discourse analysis. Malden, MA: Blackwell. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2019) On the subject of English: The linguistics of language use and learning. Berlin: de Gruyter Mouton. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zoghbor, W.
(2010) The effectiveness of the Lingua Franca Core (LFC) in improving the perceived intelligibility and perceived comprehensibility of Arab learners at post-secondary level (Doctoral thesis, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK). Retrieved from [URL]