The Effects of multilingualism and Music Experience on Tone and Vowel Discrimination Ability
type: CreativeWork
description: This study investigates the effects of language background (monolingual/bilingual and early/late bilingual exposure), knowledge of a tonal language and music experience on auditory discrimination by employing tone and vowel discrimination tasks. A total number of 8,769 observations were analyzed using logistic regression to answer the following questions: (1) Do vowel and tone discrimination abilities correlate with language background in diverse groups of speakers such as monolinguals and bilinguals of different types (early/late bilinguals)? (2) Does musical training affect tone and vowel discrimination? (3) Does knowledge of tonal language affect tone discrimination? The findings suggest that with regard to vowel discrimination, the only effective variable is early bilingual exposure. In the case of tone discrimination, early bilingual exposure, knowledge of a tonal language and music experience all have positive effects, while bilingualism (independent of early or late bilingual exposure) is associated with less accurate performance. The results suggest the positive impact of early bilingual exposure, knowledge of a tonal language and music experience on enhancing auditory discrimination and auditory sensory memory. Through its focus on the effects of language and music experience on auditory discrimination, this study contributes to the fields of linguistics and psycholinguistics.
abstract: This study investigates the effects of language background (monolingual/bilingual and early/late bilingual exposure), knowledge of a tonal language and music experience on auditory discrimination by employing tone and vowel discrimination tasks. A total number of 8,769 observations were analyzed using logistic regression to answer the following questions: (1) Do vowel and tone discrimination abilities correlate with language background in diverse groups of speakers such as monolinguals and bilinguals of different types (early/late bilinguals)? (2) Does musical training affect tone and vowel discrimination? (3) Does knowledge of tonal language affect tone discrimination? The findings suggest that with regard to vowel discrimination, the only effective variable is early bilingual exposure. In the case of tone discrimination, early bilingual exposure, knowledge of a tonal language and music experience all have positive effects, while bilingualism (independent of early or late bilingual exposure) is associated with less accurate performance. The results suggest the positive impact of early bilingual exposure, knowledge of a tonal language and music experience on enhancing auditory discrimination and auditory sensory memory. Through its focus on the effects of language and music experience on auditory discrimination, this study contributes to the fields of linguistics and psycholinguistics.
author: Ansari Dezfuly, Niloufar
language: en_ca
keywords: Bilingualism, Tonal language, Music experience, Auditory sensory memory, Vowel discrimination, Tone discrimination
date published: 2021-11-01
date modified: 2026-07-27T21:56:03Z
provider: Western University
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: The University of Western Ontario

PropertyValue
property ID: Handle
value: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14721/31710