A Study Of The Acquisition Of English Vowels By Chinese EFL Learners: An Acoustic Perspective

This thesis reports a study of the acquisition of English vowels by Chinese EFL learners(CEFLLs) from an acoustic perspective.It adopts the contrastive experimental research methodology to compare the major acoustic features of English vowels produced by CEFLLs with those produced by Received Pronunciation speakers(RPSs) and American native speakers(ASs).The subjects of the study are 30 male and 30 female CEFLLs whose production of 11 English monophthongs and 8 English diphthongs were recorded and analyzed in line with the following research questions the present study intends to address:1.To what extent do Chinese EFL learners(CEFLLs) acquire English vowels?1) What's the acquisition rate of English vowels by CEFLLs?2) What are the most/least acquired English vowels by CEFLLs?2.What are the acoustic features of English vowels by CEFLLs?1) What are the acoustic features of English monophthongs by male/female CEFLLs?(1)What's the distribution pattern of their English monophthongs?(2) What's the duration pattern of their English monophthongs?2) What are the acoustic features of English diphthongs by male/female CEFLS?(1) What's the duration pattern of their English diphthongs?(2) What're the formational features of their English diphthongs?The results of data analysis reveal the following major findings:(1) All the intelligibility rate of English vowels is above 70%,which indicates that the overall acquisition of English vowels by CEFLLs is not very bad. (2)/(?):/,/(?)/and/i:/are the three most acquired monophthongs by CEFLLs and /(?)/,/e/ and /(?):/ are the three least acquired ones;/aI/and/a(?)/are the two most acquired diphthongs and/eI/and/(?)/are the two least acquired ones.(3) By the distribution pattern of English monophthongs by CEFLLs,/(?):/ and /i:/ by CEFLLs are significantly similar to native speakers'.CEFLLs have the greatest problems with/(?):/and/(?)/,which are more fronter and lower than RPSs'.(4) CEFLLs have acquired the duration pattern of monophthongs.The duration ratio between long and short vowels is similar to native speakers'.(5) CEFLLs have noticed acoustic features of English diphthongs.FCEFLLs are more similar to native speakers in duration pattern and formational features of English diphthongs.The findings listed above shed lights into EFL phonetic teaching and learning in China.Firstly,segemental problems in CEFLLs' production Of English should not be neglected as it has been,for the intelligibility rate of some English vowels articulated by CEFLLs is far from satisfactory.Second,explicit instruction of English vowels, both monophthongs and diphthongs,should be highlighted at the beginning stage of college English learning,for a number of students fail to pronounce English vowels properly largely due to the mispronunciation of English vowels by their middle school teachers or due to badly insufficient exposure to the correct pronunciation by English native speakers.Such negative effects can only be got rid of by means of phonetic training and practice.Thirdly,speech analyzing software such as Praat is recommended to facilitate the teaching and learning of English pronunciation,which is powerful not only in the presentation of the acoustic features of English segments but also in the vivid realization of the articulation,i.e.the mechanism and procedures of the articulation.Lastly,English teachers are required to have solid knowledge of English phonology and phonetics so that they are able to perceive and produce English vowels correctly and supervise their students efficiently.