• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.1-7
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• 2019

Korean (L1)-English (L2) bilingual adults' and children's production of Korean and English stops was examined to determine the age effects and L2 experience on the development of L1 and L2 stop contrasts. Four groups of Seoul Korean speakers (experienced and inexperienced adult and child groups) and two groups of age-matched native English speakers participated. The overall results of voice onset time (VOT) and fundamental frequency (F0) of phrase-initial stops in Korean and word-intial stops in English showed a delay in the acquisition of L1 due to the dominant exposure to L2. Significantly longer VOT and lower F0 for aspirated stops as well as high temporal variability across repetitions of lenis stops were interpreted to indicate a strong effect of English on Korean stop contrasts for bilingual children. That is, the heavy use of VOT for Korean stop contrasts shows bilingual children's attention to the acoustic cue that are primarily employed in the dominant L2. Furthermore, inexperienced children, but not adults, were shown to create new L2 categories that are distinctive from the L1 within 6 months of L2 experience, suggesting greater independence between the two phonological systems. The implications of bilinguals' age at the time of testing to the degree and direction of L1-L2 interaction are further discussed.

• Acta Via Serica
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.85-102
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• 2018

This study aims to contrast phonological characteristics of Korean and Turkish in terms of language universality. Considering consonants, both languages have the same number of consonants (21), which is the most typologically plausible structure of consonants. Thus, it can be said that they display high universality in the number of consonants. However, Turkish shows higher universality in regards to their substance, i.e., it differs from Korean when it comes to the structure of plosives and affricates. Turkish has two contrastive consonants, i.e., voiced and voiceless. However, the Korean plosives and affricates consist of neutral, tense and aspirate voiceless. In the case of vowels, both Korean with 10 vowels and Turkish with 8 vowels show lower universality. Yet, all of those vowels belong to the list of the most plausible vowels which makes their universality higher in substance. In respect of the syllable structure, Korean with its (C)V(C) type shows a moderately complex structure while Turkish with its (C)V(C)(C) type has a complex structure. The coda may consist of two consonants in Turkish while only one consonant is possible in Korean. However, onset is composed of one consonant in both languages. The contrastive study of similarities and differences between Korean and Turkish in terms of phonological characteristics will help not only understand the two languages but also provide useful information to increase the efficacy of Korean language education for Turkish learners of Korean, whose number is rapidly increasing.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.6 no.4
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• pp.53-65
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• 2014

The current research examines whether pitch contour shapes in North Kyungsang pitch accent contrasts provide a phonetic dimension for phonological discreteness in a mimicry task. Two pitch accent continua resynthesized were created for HH vs. HL and HH vs. LH. To confirm a phonetic dimension for accounting for pitch accent categories in North Kyungsang Korean, the mimicries of speakers of two dialects (i.e., North Kyungsang & South Cholla) were compared. One of the findings showed that, for North Kyungsang speakers, the range of mean f0 peak times was a phonetic dimension undergoing a continuous shift within a stimulus continuum for both HH vs. HL and HH vs. LH. On the other hand, for South Cholla speakers, there were no apparent shifts around categorical boundaries for either HH vs. HL or HH vs. LH. Regarding individual mimicries on f0 peak timing, there are many variations. For HH vs. LH, three North Kyungsang speakers showed a discrete pattern reflecting a shift in phonological categories, but for HH vs. HL, there was no such distinction showing a categorical shift, though there were statistically significant differences for two speakers. Interestingly, one of the North Kyungsang speakers showed a continuous phonetic dimension for both HH vs. HL and HH vs. LH. Lastly, the f0 valley timing did not exhibit a discrete or gradient phonetic dimension for speakers of either dialect. On the basis of these results, what is interesting is that the tonal target such as high tone in North Kyungsang pitch accent categories within the autosegmental-metrical (AM) theory may be realized within individual cognitive systems for representing the interaction of perception and production.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.1 no.3
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• pp.3-18
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• 2009

Do loanword properties emerge in the acquisition of a foreign language and if so, how? Classic studies in adult language learning assumed loanword properties that range from near-ceiling to near-chance level of appearance depending on speech proficiency. The present research argues that such variations reflect different phonological types, rather than speech proficiency. To investigate the difference between learner speech and loanword phonology, the current research analyzes the speech data from five different proficiency levels of 92 Korean speakers who read 19 pairs of English words and sentences that contained loanwords. The experimental method is primarily an acoustical one, by which the phonological cause in the loanwords (e.g., the insertion of [$\Box$] at the end of the word stamp) would be attested to appear in learner speech, in comparison with native speech from 11 English speakers and 11 Korean speakers. The data investigated for the research are of segment deletion, insertion, substitution, and alternation in both learner speech and the native speech. The results indicate that learner speech does not present the loanword properties in many cases, but depends on the types of phonological causes. The relatively easy acquisition of target pronunciation is evidenced in the cases of segment deletion, insertion, substitution, and alternation, except when the loanword property involves the successful command of the target phonology such as the de-aspiration of [p] in apple. Such a case of difficult learning draws a sharp distinction from the cases of easy learning in the development of learner speech, particularly beyond the intermediate level of proficiency. Overall, learner speech departs from loanword phonology and develops toward the native speech value, depending on phonological contrasts in the native and foreign languages.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.4 no.3
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• pp.43-49
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• 2012

This paper describes the categorical effects of pitch accent contrasts in a mimicry task. It focuses, specifically, on examining how fundamental frequency (f0) variation reflects phonological contrasts from speakers of two distinct varieties of Korean (i.e., North Kyungsang and South Cholla). The results showed that, in a mimicry task using synthetic speech continua, there was a categorical effect in f0 peak timing for North Kyungsang speakers, but the timing of f0 peaks and valleys in the responses of South Cholla speakers was more variable, presenting a gradient or non-categorical effect. Evidence of categorical effects was represented as the shift of f0 peak times along an acoustic continuum for North Kyungsang speakers. The range for the shift of f0 valley times was much narrower, compared to that of f0 peak times. The degree of a shift near the middle of the continuum showed variability across individual mimicry responses. However, the categorical structure in mimicry responses regarding the clustering of f0 peak points was more significant for North Kyungsang speakers than for South Cholla speakers. Additionally, the finding of the current study implies that the location of f0 peak times depends on individuals' imitative (or cognitive) abilities.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• v.35
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• pp.293-314
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• 2014

This paper aims to contrast phonology of Korean and Thai in terms of language universality. Considering consonants, both languages having 21 typologically most plausible consonants display high universality in the number of consonants. However, Thai shows higher universality in regards to their substance, i.e. it differs from Korean when it comes to the structure of plosives and fricatives. Both Korean and Thai show similarities regarding the plosives due to the fact that both languages possess three contrastive consonants. However, the Thai plosives consist of plain voiced, plain voiceless and aspirated voiceless sounds that have higher universality than the Korean plosives which are plain voiced, plain voiceless and aspirated voiceless. In case of vowels, both Korean with its 10 vowels and Thai with its 9 vowels show lower universality when it comes to the total number of vowels. However, all of those vowels belong to the list of most plausible vowels which makes their universality higher in substance. In respect of syllable structure, Korean with its CVC type shows a moderately complex structure while Thai with its CCVC type has a complex structure. The coda may consist of only one consonant in each language but onset is composed of one consonant in Korean, and two consonants in Thai. The contrastive study of similarities and differences between Korean and Thai in terms of phonology will help not only understand the two languages but also provide useful information for increasing the efficacy of Korean language education for Thai learners of Korean whose number is rapidly increasing.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.1 no.4
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• pp.17-27
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• 2009

Despite many studies on the production and perception of L2 phonemes, studies on how such phonemes are encoded lexically remain scarce. The aim of this study is to examine whether L2 learners have a perceptual problem with L2 suprasegmentals which are not present in their L1, or if they are able to perceive but not able to encode them in their lexicon. Specifically, Korean learners were tested to see if they could discriminate the vowel length differences in Japanese at the psychoacoustic level through a simple AX discrimination task. Then, a speeded lexical decision task with high phonetic variability was conducted to see whether they could use such contrasts lexically. The results showed that Korean learners of Japanese have no difficulties in discriminating Japanese vowel length contrast, but they are unable to encode such contrast in their phonological representation, even with long L2 exposure.

• MALSORI
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• no.33_34
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• pp.91-98
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• 1997

Auditory discrimination which represents a very basic and important perceptual skill in children is a necessary condition for effective learning. It is necessary, therefore, to devise a standardized test tool for a reliable assessment of the auditory discrimination ability of children. The Korean Auditory Discrimination Test(KADT) is a tentative test tool that the authors have devised to meet such demand, i.e., to test the auditory discrimination ability of Korean children, both normal and hearing- and speech-impaired, between the ages of 4 and 8. The KADT consists of 40 pairs of words arranged in a systematic manner, of which thirty are 'minimal pairs' of words and the rest homophonous synonyms. The 30 minimal pairs are composed in such a way that major phonological contrasts involving consonants and vowels at initial, medial and final positions are duly represented. The test score will be determined by the number of right responses made by the children. Further attempts will be made to refine and improve KADT in future.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.233-247
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• 2004

This study explores sound alternations in a consonant cluster in which at least one consonant is a sonorant (a son/C cluster, hereafter). In this study, I argue that phonological processes affecting son/C clusters result from low perceptual salience rather than from the Syllable Contact Law as discussed in Vennemann (1988), Clements (1990), Rice & Avery (1991), Baertsch & Davis (2000), among others. That is, as a main factor motivating the alternations in the cluster, I consider contrasts of weak perceptibility triggered by phonetic similarity between two members of a cluster (Kawasaki 1982, Ohala 1992, 1993). Based on the findings from a typological survey in 31 different languages, I show that a speech perception-based account makes a correct prediction regarding the patterning of sonorant/sonorant sequences and that of obstruent/sonorant sequences, while the syllable contact account does not.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.4 no.2
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• pp.61-70
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• 2012

The current study observes the durational interaction of tautosyllabic consonants and vowels in the word-initial position of English and Korean child-directed speech (CDS). The effect of phonological laryngeal contrasts in stops on the following vowel duration, and the effect of the intrinsic vowel duration on the release duration of preceding stops in addition to the acoustic realization of the contrastive segments are explored in different prosodic contexts - phrase-initial/medial, focal accented/non-focused - in a marked speech style of CDS. A trade-off relationship between Voice Onset Time (VOT), as consonant release duration, and voicing phonation time, as vowel duration, reported from adult-to-adult speech, and patterns of durational variability are investigated in CDS of two languages with different linguistic rhythms, under systematically controlled prosodic contexts. Speech data were collected from four native English mothers and four native Korean mothers who were talking to their one-word staged infants. In addition to the acoustic measurements, the transformed delta measure is employed as a variability index of individual tokens. Results confirm the durational correlation between prevocalic consonants and following vowels. The interaction is revealed in a compensatory pattern such as longer VOTs followed by shorter vowel durations in both languages. An asymmetry is found in CV interaction in that the effect of consonant on vowel duration is greater than the VOT differences induced by the vowel. Prosodic effects are found such that the acoustic difference is enhanced between the contrastive segments under focal accent, supporting the paradigmatic strengthening effect. Positional variation, however, does not show any systematic effects on the variations of the measured acoustic quantities. Overall vowel duration and syllable duration are longer in English tokens but involve less variability across the prosodic variations. The constancy of syllable duration, therefore, is not found to be more strongly sustained in Korean CDS. The stylistic variation is discussed in relation to the listener under linguistic development in CDS.