The efficacy of grapheme-phoneme correspondence instruction in reducing the effect of orthographic forms on second language phonology

Bene Bassetti; Tania Cerni; Jackie Masterson

doi:10.1017/S014271642200008X

The efficacy of grapheme-phoneme correspondence instruction in reducing the effect of orthographic forms on second language phonology

Bene Bassetti, Tania Cerni, Jackie Masterson

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Abstract

The orthographic forms (spellings) of second language (L2) words and sounds affect the pronunciation and awareness of L2 sounds, even after lengthy naturalistic exposure. This study investigated whether instruction could reduce the effects of English orthographic forms on Italian native speakers’ pronunciation and awareness of L2 English sounds. Italians perceive, produce, and judge the same sound as a short sound if it is spelled with one letter and as a long sound if it is spelled with a digraph, due to L1 Italian grapheme-phoneme correspondence (GPC) rules whereby double consonant letters represent long consonants. Totally, 100 Italian learners of English were allocated to two conditions (final n = 88). The participants in the explicit GPC (EGPC) condition discovered English GPC rules relating to sound length through reflection, explicit teaching, and practice; the participants in the passive exposure condition practiced the same words as the EGPC participants, but with no mention of GPCs. Pre- and postintervention production (delayed word repetition) and phonological awareness (rhyme judgment) tasks revealed no positive effects of the instruction. GPC instruction appears to be ineffective in reducing orthographic effects on L2 phonology. Orthographic effects may be impervious to change, whether by naturalistic exposure or by instruction.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	683-705
Number of pages	23
Journal	Applied Psycholinguistics
Volume	43
Issue number	3
Early online date	24 Mar 2022
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1017/S014271642200008X
Publication status	Published - May 2022

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
The authors are grateful to Paolo Mairano for managing and performing spoken materials recording and acoustic analyses; David Torgerson for advice on intervention set-up and data analysis; June McCready for advice on pronunciation teaching; Emanuela Buizza and Valentina De Iacovo for contributing to the acoustic analysis; Sheila Verrier for proofreading teaching materials and recording spoken materials. This work was supported by a Leverhulme Trust Research Grant [grant number: RPG 2013 180] awarded to Bassetti and Masterson. The sponsor had no involvement in the conduct of the research or the preparation of the article.

Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press.

Keywords

group randomised trial
orthographic effects
phonological awareness
pronunciation
pronunciation instruction
second language phonology

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Experimental and Cognitive Psychology
Language and Linguistics
Linguistics and Language
Psychology(all)

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Cite this

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title = "The efficacy of grapheme-phoneme correspondence instruction in reducing the effect of orthographic forms on second language phonology",

abstract = "The orthographic forms (spellings) of second language (L2) words and sounds affect the pronunciation and awareness of L2 sounds, even after lengthy naturalistic exposure. This study investigated whether instruction could reduce the effects of English orthographic forms on Italian native speakers{\textquoteright} pronunciation and awareness of L2 English sounds. Italians perceive, produce, and judge the same sound as a short sound if it is spelled with one letter and as a long sound if it is spelled with a digraph, due to L1 Italian grapheme-phoneme correspondence (GPC) rules whereby double consonant letters represent long consonants. Totally, 100 Italian learners of English were allocated to two conditions (final n = 88). The participants in the explicit GPC (EGPC) condition discovered English GPC rules relating to sound length through reflection, explicit teaching, and practice; the participants in the passive exposure condition practiced the same words as the EGPC participants, but with no mention of GPCs. Pre- and postintervention production (delayed word repetition) and phonological awareness (rhyme judgment) tasks revealed no positive effects of the instruction. GPC instruction appears to be ineffective in reducing orthographic effects on L2 phonology. Orthographic effects may be impervious to change, whether by naturalistic exposure or by instruction.",

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author = "Bene Bassetti and Tania Cerni and Jackie Masterson",

note = "Funding Information: The authors are grateful to Paolo Mairano for managing and performing spoken materials recording and acoustic analyses; David Torgerson for advice on intervention set-up and data analysis; June McCready for advice on pronunciation teaching; Emanuela Buizza and Valentina De Iacovo for contributing to the acoustic analysis; Sheila Verrier for proofreading teaching materials and recording spoken materials. This work was supported by a Leverhulme Trust Research Grant [grant number: RPG 2013 180] awarded to Bassetti and Masterson. The sponsor had no involvement in the conduct of the research or the preparation of the article. Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press.",

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The efficacy of grapheme-phoneme correspondence instruction in reducing the effect of orthographic forms on second language phonology

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Keywords

ASJC Scopus subject areas

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