Charles B. Chang

City University of Hong Kong | CityU · Department of Linguistics and Translation

In previous work examining heritage language phonology, heritage speakers have often patterned differently from native speakers and late-onset second language (L2) learners with respect to overall accent and segmentals. The current study extended this line of inquiry to suprasegmentals, comparing the properties of lexical tones produced by heritage...

Research on the linguistic knowledge of heritage speakers has been concerned primarily with the advantages conferred by heritage language experience in production, perception, and (re)learning of the heritage language. Meanwhile, second-language speech research has begun to investigate potential benefits of first-language transfer in second-languag...

This study investigates the source and status of a recent sound change in Shanghainese (Wu, Sinitic) that has been attributed to language contact with Mandarin. The change involves two vowels, /e/ and /ɛ/, reported to be merged three decades ago but produced distinctly in contemporary Shanghainese. Results of two production experiments show that sp...

Tone languages such as Mandarin use voice pitch to signal lexical contrasts, presenting a challenge for second/foreign language (L2) learners whose native languages do not use pitch in this manner. The present study examined components of an aptitude for mastering L2 lexical tone. Native English speakers with no previous tone language experience co...

Previous findings on adult second-language (L2) learners showed systematic phonetic changes in their production of the native language (L1) starting in the first weeks of L2 learning [Chang, C. B. (2012). Rapid and multifaceted effects of second-language learning on first-language speech production. Journal of Phonetics, 40, 249–268]. This “phoneti...

Achieving adult-like coarticulation, which relies on precise gestural coordination, is known to be a challenging aspect of phonological development. Unique coordination challenges are posed by doubly articulated stops, typologically uncommon complex consonants that show crosslinguistic variation in their acoustic contrast with simplex (singly artic...

This contribution presents an overview of what is currently known about phonetic and phonological first language (L1) attrition and drift in bilingual speech as well as a new theory of bilingual speech, Attrition & Drift in Access, Production, and Perception Theory (ADAPPT), which devotes special attention to L1 change. Attrition and drift are defi...

Twi (Akan) and English can both express diminutive meaning using a morphological strategy (diminutive suffix) or a syntactic strategy (adjectival construction), but they differ with respect to native-speaker preferences -- morphological in Twi, syntactic in English. Each strategy in Twi, moreover, is associated with different types of complexity (m...

While there is a growing literature on the social meanings of nonmodal voice qualities, most of the existing studies focus on English and use either naturally produced speech stimuli (which are hard to control acoustically) or a small set of fully synthesized stimuli. This paper reports a perceptual study of the social meanings of creaky voice in M...

While there is a growing literature on the social meanings of nonmodal voice qualities, most of the existing studies focus on English and use either naturally produced speech stimuli (which are hard to control acoustically) or a small set of fully synthesized stimuli. This paper reports a perceptual study of the social meanings of creaky voice in M...

This chapter takes an individual-differences perspective on the dual sound systems of American heritage speakers (HSs) of Mandarin Chinese. Based on detailed socio-demographic data and production data on segmentals and suprasegmentals, we build holistic demographic and phonetic profiles for HSs, as well as native speakers and late learners, to expl...

While previous work on multilingual speech rhythm has found evidence of progressive cross-linguistic influence of a first or second language (L1, L2) on a third language (L3), regressive cross-linguistic influence (rCLI) in rhythm remains understudied. In the current study, we tested the roles of order of acquisition and of language similarity in s...

Alcohol intoxication facilitates inhibition of one's first language (L1) ego, which may lead to reduced individual differences among second language (L2) speakers under intoxication. This study examined whether, compared to speaking while sober, speaking while intoxicated would reduce individual differences in the acoustic compactness of vowel cate...

The current study examined the auditory identifiability of Asian American ethnoracial identity, including the role of listener characteristics and ideologies. Results of an identification experiment showed that the overall accuracy of ethnoracial identification on (East and Southeast) Asian talkers was low, but not the lowest among talker groups an...

Recent exposure to a second or foreign language (FL) can influence production and/or perception in the first language (L1), a phenomenon referred to as phonetic drift. The smallest amount of FL exposure shown to effect drift in perception is 1.5 h. The present study examined L1 perception at earlier timepoints of FL exposure, to determine whether t...

In this paper, we follow up on previous findings concerning first language (L1) perceptual attrition to examine the role of phoneme frequency in influencing variation across L1 contrasts. We hypothesized that maintenance of L1 Korean contrasts (i.e., resistance to attrition) in L1 Korean-L2 English bilinguals would be correlated with frequency, suc...

The present study examined sociophonetic variation in a small sample of Asian Americans in Boston, Massachusetts representing four ethnic groups: Chinese, Filipino, Korean, and Vietnamese. Analyzing these speakers’ English production in tasks eliciting both casual and careful speech, we focused on four linguistic features comprising features observ...

The lexicon of emotion words is fundamental to interpersonal communication. To examine how emotion word acquisition interacts with societal context, the present study investigated emotion word development in three groups of child Korean users aged 4-13: those who use Korean primarily outside the home as a majority language (MajKCs) or inside the ho...

Alcohol intoxication is known to affect pitch variability in non-tonal languages. In this study, intoxication's effects on pitch were examined in tonal and non-tonal language speakers, in both their native language (L1; German, Korean, Mandarin) and nonnative language (L2; English). Intoxication significantly increased pitch variability in the Germ...

Directional response biases due to a conceptual link between space and number, such as a left-to-right hand bias for increasing numerical magnitude, are known as the SNARC (Spatial-Numerical Association of Response Codes) effect. We investigated how the SNARC effect for numerosities would be influenced by reading-writing direction, task instruction...

This chapter provides an overview of research on heritage language (HL) sound systems, with a focus on areas of convergence and divergence among heritage speakers (HSs), native speakers (NSs) who continue to be dominant in the language, and second language learners (L2ers) who acquired the language later in life. Drawing on data from a wide range o...

Perception of a nonnative language (L2) is known to be affected by crosslinguistic transfer from a listener’s native language (L1), but the relative importance of L1 transfer vis-a-vis individual learner differences remains unclear. This study explored the hypothesis that the nature of L1 transfer changes as learners gain experience with the L2, su...

This chapter provides an overview of research on the phonetic changes that occur in one's native language (L1) due to recent experience in another language (L2), a phenomenon known as phonetic drift. Through a survey of empirical findings on segmental and suprasegmental acoustic properties, the chapter examines the features of the L1 that are subje...

This study examined the role of acquisition order and crosslinguistic similarity in influencing transfer at the initial stage of perceptually acquiring a tonal third language (L3). Perception of tones in Yoruba and Thai was tested in adult sequential bilinguals representing three different first (L1) and second language (L2) backgrounds: L1 Mandari...

This study examined the properties of neutral tone (T0) in Mandarin as produced by three groups: native speakers raised in a Mandarin-speaking environment (L1ers), second language learners raised in an English-speaking environment (L2ers), and heritage language speakers (HLers) exposed to Mandarin from birth but currently dominant in English. T0 pr...

Linguistic studies focusing on monolinguals have often examined individuals with considerable experience using another language. Results of a methodological review suggest that conflating ostensibly 'multicompetent' individuals with monolinguals is still common practice. A year-long longitudinal study of speech production demonstrates why this prac...

This chapter provides an overview of major theories and findings in the field of second language (L2) phonetics and phonology. Four main conceptual frameworks are discussed and compared: the Perceptual Assimilation Model-L2, the Native Language Magnet Theory, the Automatic Selective Perception Model, and the Speech Learning Model. These frameworks...

Research in second language acquisition suggests that objective performance-based assessments may provide more reliable and valid measures of second language proficiency than subjective self-ratings. To measure proficiency in English as a second language, a quick, vocabulary-based test called LexTALE (Lexical Test for Advanced Learners of English)...

One's native language (L1) is known to influence the development of a nonnative language (L2) at multiple levels, but the nature of L1 transfer to L2 perception remains unclear. This study explored the hypothesis that transfer effects in perception come from L1-specific processing strategies, which direct attention to phonetic cues according to the...

This study investigated how bilinguals’ perception of their first language (L1) differs according to age of reduced contact with L1 after immersion in a second language (L2). Twenty‐one L1 Korean‐L2 English bilinguals in the United States, ranging in age of reduced contact from 3 to 15 years, and 17 control participants in Korea were tested percept...

Seoul Korean is known for a rare three-way laryngeal contrast among lenis, fortis, and aspirated voiceless stops, which has recently undergone a change in phonetic implementation: whereas older speakers rely more on voice onset time (VOT) to distinguish lenis and aspirated stops, younger speakers rely more on onset fundamental frequency (F0) in the...

Tone languages such as Mandarin use voice pitch to signal lexical contrasts, presenting a challenge for second/foreign language (L2) learners whose native languages do not use pitch in this manner. The present study examined components of an aptitude for mastering L2 lexical tone. Native English speakers with no previous tone language experience co...

In previous work examining heritage language phonology, heritage speakers have often patterned differently from native speakers and late-onset second language (L2) learners with respect to overall accent and segmentals. The current study extended this line of inquiry to suprasegmentals, comparing the properties of lexical tones produced by heritage...

This study investigated the source and status of a recent sound change in Shanghainese (Wu, Sinitic) that has been attributed to language contact with Mandarin. The change involves two vowels, /e/ and /ɛ/, reported to be merged three decades ago but produced distinctly in contemporary Shanghainese. Results of two production experiments showed that...

This study investigates the source and status of a recent sound change in Shanghainese (Wu, Sinitic) that has been attributed to language contact with Mandarin. The change involves two vowels, /e/ and /ɛ/, reported to be merged three decades ago but produced distinctly in contemporary Shanghainese. Results of two production experiments show that sp...

Studies of lexical tone learning generally focus on monosyllabic contexts, while reports of phonetic learning benefits associated with input variability are based largely on experienced learners. This study trained inexperienced learners on Mandarin tonal contrasts to test two hypotheses regarding the influence of context and variability on tone le...

Vowels tend to be reduced in words that are semantically predictable from context, an effect amenable to talker-or listener-oriented accounts of speech production. This study explored the role of perception in these accounts by testing for effects of semantic predictability on vowel production in the face of impaired speech perception (but otherwis...

Phonetic studies meant to generalize to monolingual speakers of a target language have often examined individuals with considerable experience using another language, such as the immigrant native speaker. This paper presents, first, results from a meta-analysis of the literature, suggesting that conflation of ostensibly bilingual (“multicompetent”)...

Although the general notion of “phonological similarity” has figured prominently in linguistic scholarship, the manner in which talkers determine similarity between phonological units is not well understood. Recent research has shown that perceptual similarity does not account for input-output mappings between languages as well as it does within a...

Second-language (L2) speech perception is typically worse than first-language (L1) perception, a disparity often attributed to negative transfer (interference) from the L1 of L2 listeners. The current study investigated the hypothesis that L1 transfer is not always negative, but variable depending on the nature of L1 perceptual biases. In Experimen...

In previous studies of homework in core academic subjects, positive student attitudes toward homework were linked to higher achievement, whereas time spent on homework showed an inconsistent relationship with achievement. This study examined the generalizability of these findings to foreign language learning by analyzing 2,342 adult students' attit...

This article presents new data on the contrast between the two voiceless coronal fricatives of Korean, variously described as a lenis/fortis or aspirated/fortis contrast. In utterance-initial position, the fricatives were found to differ in centroid frequency; duration of frication, aspiration, and the following vowel; and several aspects of the fo...

Phonological transfer from the native language is a common problem for non-native speakers that has repeatedly been shown to result in perceptual deficits vis-à-vis native speakers. It was hypothesized, however, that transfer could help, rather than hurt, if it resulted in a beneficial bias. Due to differences in pronunciation norms between Korean...

This study presents a detailed acoustic characterization of the contrast between the two voiceless coronal fricatives of Korean, variously described in the literature as a lenis/fortis or aspirated/fortis contrast. In utterance-initial position, the fricatives were found to differ in centroid frequency, frication duration, aspiration duration, foll...

Despite abundant evidence of malleability in speech production, previous studies of the effects of late second-language learning on first-language speech production have been limited to advanced learners. This study examined these effects in novice learners, adult native English speakers enrolled in elementary Korean classes. In two acoustic studie...

Following phonological and phonetic models of loanword adaptation, I present evidence from Burmese in favor of an intermediate model of loanword adaptation incorporating both language-independent phonetics and language-particular phonology. On the basis of a corpus of 200 loanword adaptations from English into Burmese, I first show that Burmese loa...

Studies of proficient second-language (L2) learners have often noted phonetic drift of their native language (L1) vis-à-vis monolingual norms. Such drift has been attributed to perceptual linkage between similar sounds in L1 and L2. This study provides evidence that L1 phonetic drift is limited neither to advanced L2 learners, nor to cross-language...

This study tested the hypothesis that heritage speakers of a minority language, due to their childhood experience with two languages, would outperform late learners in producing contrast: language-internal phonological contrast, as well as cross-linguistic phonetic contrast between similar, yet acoustically distinct, categories of different languag...

Despite abundant evidence of malleability in speech production, previous studies of the effects of late second-language learning on first-language production have been limited to advanced learners. This dissertation examines these effects in novice learners, finding that experience in a second language rapidly, and possibly inexorably, affects prod...

Research on how second-language (L2) learners acquire L2 laryngeal categories has focused on languages with “voiced” and “voiceless” categories that differ in terms of one main cue: voice onset time. The present study examines how L2 learners come to produce a laryngeal contrast that requires the use of a second phonetic dimension—namely, the three...

In two experiments, we investigated the production of Mandarin and English by heritage speakers of Mandarin in comparison to native Mandarin speakers and late learners. In Experiment 1, speakers in all groups made an F2 distinction between Mandarin and English back vowels, with native Mandarin speakers' vowels in both languages having lower F2 valu...

Research on how second-language (L2) learners acquire L2 laryngeal categories has focused on languages with “voiced” and “voiceless” categories that differ in terms of one main cue: voice onset time. The present study examines how L2 learners come to produce a laryngeal contrast that requires the use of a second phonetic dimension—namely, the three...

I investigate the nature of L1 constraints on L2 phonological acquisition by examining the development of laryngeal categories for lenis, fortis, and aspirated stops in 20 L1 English novice learners of Korean. In a longitudinal imitation experiment, learners heard and repeated a two-dimensional continuum of Korean syllables differing in the primary...

Mounting evidence has shown that native language (L1) phonetic representations can be affected by extensive second language (L2) learning. In this study the nature and time course of this phonetic drift in L1 are examined in a longitudinal investigation of 20 L1 English speakers’ first 5 weeks of learning Korean as L2. Acoustic analyses of these le...

This paper investigates the nature and time course of phonetic drift in L1 by examining the very first weeks of 20 L1 English speakers' acquisition of Korean as L2. Acoustic analyses of these learners' L1 and L2 production over time indicate that learning L2 stops affects the production of L1 stops (in terms of VOT and/or f0 onset) in as little as...

This study investigated the production of five Mandarin and English sibilant fricatives by heritage speakers of Mandarin in comparison to native speakers and late learners. Almost all speakers were found to distinguish the Mandarin retroflex and alveolo-palatal, as well as the Mandarin alveolo-palatal and English palato-alveolar. However, fewer dis...

This paper provides a descriptive account of the main patterns found in the adaptation of English loanwords in Burmese. First, English segments missing from the Burmese inventory are replaced by native Burmese segments. Second, coda obstruents are represented by laryngealized tones. Third, consonant clusters are resolved through vowel epenthesis or...

In recent years, building web-accessible dictionaries has become a new way of organizing and publishing data from linguistic fieldwork on indigenous languages. This paper provides an overview of one such online dictionary. The language we worked on was Southeastern Pomo, an endangered native American language which was historically spoken in the ar...

This study reexamines the typologically unusual three-way laryngeal contrast in Korean among ‘lenis’, ‘fortis’, and ‘aspirated’ voiceless plosives in light of a recent proposal by Kim and Duanmu (2004) that the contrast is really among voiced, voiceless unaspirated, and voiceless aspirated categories. The results of a cross-linguistic perception ex...

Previous research on language attrition has distinguished between internally and externally motivated change and between convergent and divergent change, with most literature focusing on speech communities that have undergone either one or the other type of change. In this paper, I argue that these types of change may coexist within the same commun...

Preprint of article (published in the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America) in the UC Berkeley PhonLab Annual Report, 5.

Preprint of article (published in Harvard Studies in Korean Linguistics, vol. 13) in the UC Berkeley PhonLab Annual Report, 5.

Preprint of article (published in Current Issues in Linguistic Interfaces, vol. 2) in the UC Berkeley PhonLab Annual Report, 5.

Article in the UC Berkeley PhonLab Annual Report, 5.

This study of palatal production in Argentina confirms that there are three types of speakers (voicers, devoicers, and variable devoicers) in Buenos Aires. Furthermore, the results indicate that 30 years after Fontanella de Weinberg's (1978) study of palatals, variation between voiced and voiceless allophones of the palatal phoneme is still correla...

This study examined the production of the two-way laryngeal contrast in Korean sibilant fricatives in two experiments covering low and high vowel environments. Acoustic analyses show that in a low vowel environment, the two fricatives differ from each other in fricative duration, aspiration duration, F1 onset, intensity buildup, and voice quality;...

Following recent acoustic investigations of obsolescing languages such as Babel (2007), I present an acoustic study of phonetic change in Southeastern Pomo (Northern Hokan, Pomoan) based upon recordings of two generations of speakers. This paper focuses on the realization of two phonological contrasts: A velar/post‐velar contrast and a dental/alveo...

Acoustic analyses of normal voiced and whispered Mandarin Chinese reveal significant differences in duration and intensity among the four lexical tones, differences that are moreover similar across the two speech genres. In contrast to previous claims, however, these differences among the tones are found to shrink in whisper rather than being exagg...

Four experiments were conducted to investigate the contrast between the two voiceless sibilant fricatives of Korean. The results of Experiment 1 show that before /a/, the two fricatives differ in total segment duration, aspiration duration, F1 onset, intensity buildup, and voice quality. The results of Experiment 2 indicate that while segmental dur...

This study reexamines the typologically unusual three-way laryngeal contrast in Korean among ‘lenis’, ‘fortis’, and ‘aspirated’ voiceless plosives in light of a recent proposal by Kim and Duanmu (2004) that the contrast is really among voiced, voiceless unaspirated, and voiceless aspirated categories. The results of a cross-linguistic perception ex...

The well-described laryngeal system of Korean has most often been analyzed as a typologically unique contrast among three kinds of voiceless plosives: aspirated, lax, and tense. This paper focuses on the phonetics of the tense series by examining the perception of obstruents described as tense in Korean and as voiceless unaspirated in Chinese, Span...

Are all meanings of a homograph accessed even when only one is appropriate in context? Priming data collected in this study suggest that contextually inappropriate homographs are not activated, consistent with models of reading in which phonology mediates between orthography and semantics, although they do not rule out a dual-route model. It may be...

Full text available at: https://cbchang.com/wp-content/uploads/Chang_ms_fastspeech.pdf

Full text available at: https://cbchang.com/wp-content/uploads/Chang_ms_koreanexistentials.pdf

Lexical borrowing is a common process across languages. Even so, words borrowed into a language are rarely borrowed perfectly, but instead undergo modification vis-à-vis their realization in the source language from which they were borrowed. This process of modification may result from the influence of the phonology native to the borrowing language...