First and second language similarity can hurt the learning of second-language speech segmentation: The case of prosody

This study investigates whether learning to use prosodic cues to word boundaries in second-language speech segmentation is easier or more difficult if the native and second languages have similar (though non-identical) prosodies than if they have markedly different prosodies. It compares French, Korean, and English listeners’ use of fundamental-frequency rise and lengthening as cues to word-final boundaries in French. Fundamental-frequency rise and lengthening signal word-final boundaries in French and Korean but can signal word-initial boundaries in English. Proficiency-matched Korean-speaking and Englishspeaking second-language learners of French and native French listeners completed a ‘visual-world’ eye-tracking task where fundamental-frequency rise and/or lengthening signaled the final boundary of target words. Results show that the French and English groups used both fundamental-frequency rise and lengthening to locate word-final boundaries in French, whereas the Korean group used only lengthening. We attribute Korean listeners’ non-use of fundamental-frequency rise in French to firstand second-language perceptual assimilation.