NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders Chapter 14 Acquisition of the English Voicing Contrast by Native Spanish-Speaking Children: Phonological Development in Voice Onset Times Eugene H. Buder Linda Jarmulowicz D. Kimbrough Oller 1

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders Introduction Background on simultaneous and sequential language acquisition in Chapter 13 (MacLeod) – “Unitary System” hypothesis – “Dual System” hypothesis Young children acquiring two languages may show phonetic interaction effects that can be measured acoustically but not always reliably heard This chapter describes a phonetic approach to the speech of a 4-year-old child with Spanish as L1 and English as L2 2

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders Review of Voice Onset Times in Stop Production Stop gap Burst Aspiration Voicing Voice Onset Time (VOT) – Prevoiced (negative VOT) – Short-lag – Long-lag English contrasts – Short-lag unaspirated vs. long-lag aspirated Spanish contrasts – Prevoiced vs. short-lag unaspirated How do young Spanish- children deal with a different set of categories when acquiring English? 3

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders 4 Figure The word “secure” spoken by a female adult who is a native speaker of English

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders 5 Table 14.1 Understanding the International Phonetic Alphabet system for Universal Transcription of Voicing Contrasts in English and Spanish

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders Spanish-English Bilingualism: Early Acquisition and L1 Effects “Phonology and Literacy in Early Bilinguals” (Oller, Jarmulowicz, and Buder) – Word lists for English and Spanish words Coronal phonemes in word initial, medial, and final position Recorded as spoken by native speakers – Repetition task – Spanish-speaking girl, age 5;4 at beginning of study, 5;10 at follow-up – Exposure to English at beginning of schooling 6

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders 7 Figure 14.2 Stimulus word “depende”: Spanish word-initial “d” [d] is prevoiced Figure 14.3 Stimulus word “tazas”: Spanish word initial “t” [t] is short lag unaspirated

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders 8 Figure 14.4 Stimulus word “dizzy”: English word-initial “d” [t] is short lag unaspirated Figure 14.5 Stimulus word “tardy”: English word-initial “t” [t h ] is long lag aspirated

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders 9 Figure 14.6 “Donut ” produced by SF1 at age 5;4: English word-initial “d” [t] is correctly produced with short lag unaspirated VOT

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders In the early stage of acquiring English, SF1 produced the Spanish contrasts (prevoicing, short lag unaspirated) correctly She also produced the English contrasts (short lag unaspirated, long lag aspirated) correctly 10

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders 11 Figure 14.7 “Toot” produced by SF1 at age 5;4: English word-initial “t” [t h ] is correctly produced with long lag aspirated VOT

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders 12 Figure 14.8 “Dedos” produced by SF1 at age 5;4: Spanish word-initial “d” [d] is correctly produced with prevoicing

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders 13 Figure 14.9 “Tarde” produced by SF1 at age 5;4: Spanish word-initial “t” [t] is correctly produced with short lag unaspirated VOT

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders Six months later, at age 5;10, SF1 produced the English contrasts (short lag unaspirated, long lag aspirated) correctly However, by this time, she no longer produced the Spanish contrasts correctly – Substituted short lag unaspirated for prevoicing – Spanish “t” was still produced acceptably with short lag times of under 30 ms. A second child, SF2, also eliminated prevoicing in Spanish words in the first 6 months of exposure to English but produced half of her English “d” onsets with prevoicing Possible interpretation: Bilingual children may initially target natural ‘universal’ phonetic categories but later attend to language-specific contrasts. 14

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders 15 Figure “Depende” produced by SF1 at age 5;10: Spanish word-initial prevoiced [d] is now produced with short lag unaspirated VOT Figure “Dedos” produced by SF1 at age 5;10: Spanish word-initial prevoiced [d] is now produced with short lag unaspirated VOT

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders Interpreting the Crosslinguistic Effects Main findings from the present study – English voicing contrast was acquired soon after immersion – Spanish prevoicing deteriorated Similar findings in a study of a 3-year-old Dutch child acquiring English (Simon, 2010) – Fast acquisition of English VOT contrast – Dutch prevoicing shifted toward short lags 16

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders Concluding Remarks This study exemplifies the utility of acoustic measures to investigate interaction effects between two languages. It had been speculated that short lags are easier to produce than prevoicing. This study illustrates that it may be language-specific contrastivity, rather than specific phonetic targeting, that drives acquisition patterns. With more such VOT and transcription data, the patterns illustrated in this chapter could be statistically analyzed. 17

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders Connections Chapter 13: Topics in sequential and simultaneous acquisition of a phonological system Chapter 2: Tools for measuring acoustic properties of speech Chapter 8: Acquisition of a phonological system beyond childhood 18

NOVA Comprehensive Perspectives on Child Speech Development and Disorders 19 Sidebar 14.1 L1 language degradation Is this L1 interference phenomenon effect limited to VOT of stops? No! Research at the University of Memphis has illustrated that Spanish-speaking children who enter English- only Kindergarten show very low expressive vocabulary in Spanish within three months (Gibson, Oller, Jarmulowicz, & Ethington, in press; Oller, Jarmulowicz, Pearson, & Cobo-Lewis, 2010). Rapid shift from L1 to L2 has been described as language loss or language attrition (Oller & Jarmulowicz, 2007), and Anderson (2004) notes that children are particularly affected by language loss. A primary characteristic of language loss is a reduction, regression, or stagnation of L1 skills, particularly expressive language skills (Anderson, 1999). This pattern suggests a general loss of access to the native language although receptive skills appear to be maintained to a much greater extent.