This thesis examines whether native speakers of Dutch can aspirate unvoiced word-initial plosives in English as a second language and if they are able to do so to the same degree as native speakers...Show moreThis thesis examines whether native speakers of Dutch can aspirate unvoiced word-initial plosives in English as a second language and if they are able to do so to the same degree as native speakers of English. Aspiration was measured in word-initial unvoiced plosives /p, t, k/ using Voice Onset Time (VOT). Influence of sex, age, age of onset of the second language, and self-reported general pronunciation ability in English were also examined. Native Dutch VOT generally lies between 0-20ms, while native English VOT is anywhere between 50-100 ms. Using recordings from 19 participants who read both Dutch and English sentences out loud, it was found that participants increased their aspiration with an average of 10 ms when switching from Dutch to English. The analysis also shows that two participants out of 19 had an average VOT at a native-like level (>50 ms). Further investigation showed that sex, age, and age of onset did not influence VOT. Participants who graded their general pronunciation abilities with an 8 or higher did show a bigger increase in VOT, but there was no correlation to higher VOT in English when compared to other speakers. Other results showed that /p, t, k/ were not aspirated to the same extent, with /t/ being aspirated significantly more and /p/ significantly less. Lastly, the co-existence of words in both English and Dutch did not significantly alter the VOT, only when words started with /k/ did aspiration significantly improve when the exact word also existed in Dutch. These results conclude that native speakers of Dutch increase aspiration and can aspirate to a native-like degree while speaking English. Any defining factors of the participants who were able to do so are not available due to the limited sample size.Show less
In forensic speaker comparison, there may be cases in which the speech samples to be compared are not in the same language. Research in forensic phonetics has however almost exclusively been done...Show moreIn forensic speaker comparison, there may be cases in which the speech samples to be compared are not in the same language. Research in forensic phonetics has however almost exclusively been done in monolingual contexts. This study aims to give more clarity about what features can be used in cross-linguistic speaker comparison. This is done by investigating whether proficient first language (L1) Dutch speakers of second language (L2) English adapt the vowel in and to the target language. L2 sound learning models predict that Dutch learners will have difficulty learning the difference between /ɛ/ and /æ/ and will therefore only be able to approximate nativelike pronunciation. The vowels in en and and of 35 proficient, female Dutch speakers of English were analyzed, both as a discourse marker and a coordinating conjunction. Mixed-effect models showed that for both word classes, the F1 and F2 were language-dependent. This means that the use of /æ/ as a characteristic in cross-linguistic speaker comparison is not useful.Show less
The present study investigates to what extent students, who originate from outside of the Randstad area, accommodate their accent, during their studies here, to Leiden students who have studied in...Show moreThe present study investigates to what extent students, who originate from outside of the Randstad area, accommodate their accent, during their studies here, to Leiden students who have studied in Leiden for a longer time. Moreover, a linguistically marked feature, the ''Gooise r'' is also said to be employed in Leiden and cultivated among these Leiden students. Both of these phenomena were investigated through qualitative interviews. This was researched via the following questions. 1. To what extent do students who come from outside of Leiden accommodate their accent to their peers and why? a. What did they alter? b. To what extent do students possess the so-called Gooise ''r''? c. What are the social and or linguistic connotations of the Gooise ''r'' in Leiden student circles? d. Do they align with existing academic and popular media ones? It turned out that these students accommodated their accent and language to their peers in varying degrees. Possible reasons were their social network, intergroup relations, remarks and preventing miscommunication. The ''Gooise r'' was also present among the majority of the participants. They associated its usage with posh Leiden students or posh people in general, middle class ''Leids'' or working class ''Leienaren''. They all attributed its usage to the Randstad region.Show less
The discussion on the existence of a bilingual advantage in executive functioning is still going on to this day. But even if this advantage does exist, can we speak of a true advantage? In other...Show moreThe discussion on the existence of a bilingual advantage in executive functioning is still going on to this day. But even if this advantage does exist, can we speak of a true advantage? In other words, how does this advantage resonate in real-life? This study translated executive functions into real-world competences and tested whether bilinguals score better on these as well as on their school performances. Results show very little to no evidence of the existence of a bilingual advantage in real life. The most likely explanations are that there either is no advantage or the advantage is very small and therefore masked by other factors influencing executive functioning and bilingualism.Show less
The teaching of pronunciation is slowly receiving more attention in TESL, yet the teaching of the suprasegmental features of language (stress and intonation) it still scarce. Due to its important...Show moreThe teaching of pronunciation is slowly receiving more attention in TESL, yet the teaching of the suprasegmental features of language (stress and intonation) it still scarce. Due to its important role in communication, this project description paper presents an analysis of the effects Castilian Spanish stress and intonation have on English Questions when uttered by Castilian Spanish speakers. Additionally, it suggests Age, Age of Onset of Acquisition and Proficiency to be possible factors influencing successful pronunciation. This proposal is a replica of Valenzuela Farías’ study (2013): “A comparative Analysis of Intonation between Spanish and English speakers in Tag Questions, Wh-Questions, Inverted Questions, and Repetition Questions”. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown, this study does not have empirical results. The results shown are predictions drawn from existing research applied to the focus of this research. Hypotheses indicate a possible connection between learner’s first and second language (language transfer), in addition to Age, Age of Onset of Acquisition and Proficiency as factors influencing the successfulness of the acquisition of English pronunciation.Show less
In fluency research that contains rating experiments, it is often the case that either a) overall proficiency is examined, and participants are free to rate fluency intuitively; or b) participants...Show moreIn fluency research that contains rating experiments, it is often the case that either a) overall proficiency is examined, and participants are free to rate fluency intuitively; or b) participants are told to base their judgments on several utterance fluency characteristics, since the researcher studiesfluency in the narrow sense. In this study, I examine whether there are more speech factors that fall under the concept of fluency in the narrow sense than only the fluency characteristics that the participants are given prior to a rating task. Qualitative research into the perception of fluency on Dutch native and nonnative speech gave 17 different categories that participants take into account when judging spontaneous speech. Then, two groups of participants were juxtaposed: one group that had to judge fluency based on four utterance fluency characteristics (explicit group); and one group that only received a definition of cognitive fluency and was free to base their judgments on their own interpretation of this definition (implicit group). Results indicate that the implicit group was less likely to let disfluencies influence them negatively, but was more inclined to unconsciously judge overall proficiency rather than fluency in the narrow sense. Additionally, both groups showed a sensitivity for pause distribution that helped them to determine the speaker’s ease of lexical retrieval. I conclude that intonation and planning efficiency are essential components of fluency in the narrow sense, and should therefore be used in the instructions for future rating experiments.Show less
Although nationalist political parties are legitimate and terrorist groups are not, it is still remarkable that the rhetorical devices used by nationalist politicians are not notably different to...Show moreAlthough nationalist political parties are legitimate and terrorist groups are not, it is still remarkable that the rhetorical devices used by nationalist politicians are not notably different to the rhetorical devices used by terrorist groups. The political rhetoric of terrorist groups as well that of nationalist politicians strikes fear and fosters anger, targets minority groups and other nations, incites violence, and is exceptionally persuasive resulting in a high number of followers. The question then arises as to how similar is the rhetoric of nationalist politicians to the rhetoric of terrorist groups.Show less
