Primary Stress and Intelligibility: Research to Motivate the Teaching

of Suprasegmentals

By Laura D. Hahn

Afra MA0963004

Carolyn MA0963006

Josh MA0963015

Arwen MA0963005

Introduction

The relationship of the primary stress and intelligibility motivates The teaching of suprasegmentals

What is the Suprasegmental?

•Stress•Intonation•Timing•Rhythm •juncture

The Purpose of This Study

Whether the correct placed primary stress affects the processing, comprehension, and evaluations of the native speak listeners

Background knowledge

1.Teaching the NNS supra- segmentals does improve the intelligibility of their speech.2. Isolated primary stress※NNS means the nonnative speakers

How to realize the primary stress

By combining a detectable change in pitch with increased vowel duration and intensity

Example:

A: Are you ready?B: I’m always ready.

The GNSC

(Given-new stress connection): new and contrastive information is presented in stressed elements, and old or given information is expressed in unstressed elements.

The Chinese learners’use

the primary stress

Chinese learners used pitch movement of every word in a message unit.

Example:

Correct Wrong 1 2 1 1Living room→ Living roomBook store → Book store

Two Problems

1.Misplacing primary stress

2.Stressing all words

Method

An experimental study was designed using oral texts constructed to systematically vary the GNSC.

Subjects

90 subjects, 30 each to 3 experimental groups

They are first-semester freshman students, come from Midwestern public university and speak North American English

Materials

Three versions of a text recording by a Korean. Digital editing techniques make sure these three versions equal, including volume and length (4.5 minutes).

Three versions

Version A: GNSC was maintained. Version B: GNSC was violated through misplaced primary stress. Version C: GNSC was violated through absence of primary stress.

The main purpose1. Measure of Difficulty Processing Discourse * Dual-task paradigm * The participants’ primary task was A. to understand and remember the lecture’s content B. to monitor for a tone presented in the background of the speech

2. Measure of Comprehension

* The study measured in two ways(1)subjects were asked to write down as

much as they could recall from the lecture (2)a short-answer comprehension quiz * The questions elicited each main idea in

the lecture.

3. Measure of Evaluative Reactions to the

Speaker

* Instructor and Course Evaluation System (ICES) Item

Catalog: use to collect feedback from students on their classroom instruction.

Procedure 30 30 30

First, the researcher explained the instructions and

the format of the experiment.

Second, specific instructions and practice for

the reaction time task were provided on the

computer.

Third, the subjects were then informed

that they would be listening to a TA and

were then asked to complete the reaction

time task, the recall, the quiz, and the

ICES ratings in that order.

RESULTS

As shown in the following Table:

3

Discussion

This consistent pattern in the results supports the general proposition that correct primary stress in extended nonnative discourse facilitates communication.

Implications for ITA programs and curricula

It therefore seems logical that the ITA curriculum

should include instruction in primary stress.

A broad perspective that acknowledges the various roles that pronunciation features play in communicating meaning in discourse would enhance ITA programs and materials.

Implications for pronunciation pedagogy and

materials

Fortunately, primary stress can be learned, primary stress is both

teachable and valuable for communicating.

Conclusion

This research provides evidence that primary stress contributes significantly to the intelligibility of nonnative discourse, and it strengthens the broadly stated claims in the pedagogical literature on ESL pronunciation that teaching suprasegmentals is important.