Training American listeners to perceive Mandarin tones

TLDR

Auditory training has proven effective for non‑native segmental distinctions, and this study explores its applicability to non‑native suprasegmental contrasts such as Mandarin tones. The study investigated whether high‑variability auditory training can facilitate acquisition of Mandarin tones by American learners. Eight American Mandarin learners underwent eight high‑variability training sessions over two weeks, during which they identified four tones in natural words spoken by native Mandarin speakers. Training produced a mean 21 % improvement from pre‑test to post‑test, with gains generalizing to new stimuli (18 %) and new talkers (25 %), and a six‑month retention test showed the improvement was maintained with a 21 % increase over the pre‑test.

Abstract

Auditory training has been shown to be effective in the identification of non-native segmental distinctions. In this study, it was investigated whether such training is applicable to the acquisition of non-native suprasegmental contrasts, i.c., Mandarin tones. Using the high-variability paradigm, eight American learners of Mandarin were trained in eight sessions during the course of two weeks to identify the four tones in natural words produced by native Mandarin talkers. The trainees' identification accuracy revealed an average 21% increase from the pretest to the post-test, and the improvement gained in training was generalized to new stimuli (18% increase) and to new talkers and stimuli (25% increase). Moreover, the six-month retention test showed that the improvement was retained long after training by an average 21% increase from the pretest. The results are discussed in terms of non-native suprasegmental perceptual modification, and the analogies between L2 acquisition processes at the segmental and suprasegmental levels.