IOE student’s MA dissertation published in international journal

Chaoqun’s MA dissertation explores how music aptitude and auditory perception influence second language learners learning pronunciation. In the study, the researchers looked at 48 moderately experienced Chinese learners of English who had lived in the UK for one year. They examined the relationship between music aptitude, a talent for perceiving musical sounds such as rhythms, keys etc.; auditory perception, the ability to hear very subtle differences in basic acoustic information such as frequencies, duration, intensity; and second language pronunciation skill.

The study found that learners who pronounced words closer to native speakers’ pronunciation demonstrated more precise auditory processing abilities. However, music aptitude was not necessarily a good predictor of successful second language learners. The study suggests that having a good ear matters for language learning throughout the lifespan and may be applicable to adults’ second language learning as it is for children’s’ first language acquisition.

Dr Kazuya Saito, Chaoqun’s supervisor, said: “It’s an amazing achievement that Chaoqun’s dissertation has been published in a top-tier journal in the field of second language acquisition, Second Language Research. It’s so rare to see MA students’ dissertations published in a prestigious journal of this kind and is an incredible testament to Chaoqun’s study.”

Second Language Research is a peer-reviewed academic journal in the field of linguistics, concerned foremost with second language acquisition and second-language performance.

Links

• Read the paper: ‘Successful second language pronunciation learning is linked to domain-general auditory processing rather than music aptitude’
• Centre for Applied Linguistics
• Department of Culture, Communication and Media

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Jack Latimer for UCL via UCL Imagestore