Perception and analysis of Spanish accents in English speech

The purpose of the present study was to determine what relates most closely to the degree of perceived foreign accent in the English speech of native Spanish speakers: intonation, vowel length, stress, voice onset time (VOT), or segmental accuracy. Nineteen native English speaking listeners rated speech samples from 7 native English speakers and 15 native Spanish speakers for comprehensibility and degree of foreign accent. The speech samples were analyzed spectrographically and auditorally to obtain numerical values for each variable. These values and the average foreign accent scores were submitted to Pearson correlations. Results show that the average foreign accent scores were significantly correlated with three variables: the length of stressed vowels (r = -.48, p < .05), VOT (r = -.62, p < .01), and segmental accuracy (r = .92, p < .001). Segmental accuracy correlated most significantly with the foreign accent scores.

Name thesis:degree_name

MA

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

World Languages, Literatures and Linguistics

Year dc:date.available

2000

Author dc:creator

• Kropf, Corinne Ann

Contributors dc:contributor

• Johan Seynnaeve.
• Susan Briadi
• Norman Lass

• Linguistics
• Bilingual education

Identifier

https://researchrepository.wvu.edu/etd/832

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:researchrepository.wvu.edu:etd-1835