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Article published In:
Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism
Vol. 11:3 (2021) ► pp.289–322

Language attitudes modulate phonetic interactions between languages in bilingual speakers in diglossic settings

| Chinese University of Hong Kong Shenzhen
| Purdue University
| Purdue University
Bilinguals’ attitudes toward their languages can be a major source of linguistic variability. However, the effect of attitudes on crosslinguistic phonetic interactions in bilinguals remains largely unexplored. This study investigated the possibility of such effects in Cantonese-English bilinguals in Hong Kong (n = 26). Participants produced near-homophones in each language on separate days. Formant values of Cantonese [ɐ] and English [ʌ] and degrees of diphthongization of Cantonese [o] and [ai], and English [oʊ] and [ai], were analyzed as a function of language proficiency, use, and language attitude scores drawn from a background questionnaire. Participants’ attitudes toward Cantonese were predictive of the acoustic difference between similar Cantonese and Hong Kong English (HKE) vowels: More Cantonese-oriented speakers produced greater acoustic distance between crosslinguistically similar vowels. No effects of English attitudes, proficiency, or use were found. These results demonstrate that bilinguals’ attitude toward their native language can affect the degree of phonetic similarity between the two languages they speak.
Keywords: language attitudes, cross-language phonetic interactions, diglossic bilinguals
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
    • 1.1The present study
      • 1.1.1The Hong Kong diglossic community
      • 1.1.2Factors affecting language interaction in Hong Kong bilinguals
      • 1.1.3Vowels in Hong Kong English and Cantonese
  • 2.Methods
    • 2.1Materials
      • 2.1.1Questionnaire
      • 2.1.2Elicitation stimuli
    • 2.2Participants
    • 2.3Procedures
    • 2.4Analysis of questionnaire results
    • 2.5Acoustic analysis
    • 2.6Statistical analysis of acoustic measurements
  • 3.Results
    • 3.1Correlations between questionnaire variables
    • 3.2Cantonese [ɔ] and English [i]
    • 3.3Euclidean distance measures
    • 3.4Formant trajectories for [o] and [oʊ]
    • 3.5Formant trajectories for Cantonese and English [ai]
    • 3.6Cantonese [ɐ] and English [ʌ]
    • 3.7Summary
  • 4.Discussion
    • 4.1Cantonese attitudes affect cross-language phonetic patterns
    • 4.2English attitudes, proficiency, and use
  • Acknowledgements
  • Note
  • References
Published online: 4 October 2019
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/lab.18085.law
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