The Research On Production And Perception Of Chinese Tones By Thai Speakers

The study based on two experiments: one of the experiment is in production which about the syllabic length in Chinese sentences by primary level and advanced level Thai speakers.Another one is in perception of Tone 2 and Tone 3 in Chinese by primary level and advanced level Thai speakers.This paper is divided into four chapters:The first chapter: the introduction,this part mainly describes the background of the research.This part is an overview of syllabic length in Chinese,and the current research findings about Chinese phonetics errors of Thai students.Finally,in the results of previous studies,we decide the subjects,experimental materials and two experiments.The second chapter: the experiment in syllabic length in Thai sentences and Chinese sentences.The first part is the experiment in syllabic length in Thai sentences.We research on native Thai speakers,then we get the syllabic length in Thai sentences and describe the characteristics of different syllables in Thai.The second part is the experiment in syllabic length in Chinese sentences by native Chinese speakers,primary level and advanced level Thai speakers.At first,We research on native Chinese speakers.We get Chinese four tones orders and syllabic lengths in Chinese sentences.And we figure out the result is similar to previous studies,so we use this result as reference to Thai speakers.With this part of the analysis of pronunciation,we find that both levels Thai speakers have acquisition errors in Chinese syllabic length.But,advanced level Thai speakers are more similar to native speakers in pronunciation than primary level Thai speakers.The higher level of Chinese acquisition the student was,the lower degree of syllabic length bias errors in Chinese sentences the student had.Moreover,the reason why Thai speakers’ syllabic length is longer than native speakers,is that they are influenced by long vowels in Thai.The third chapter: the experiment in perception of Tone 2 and Tone 3.It had been found that,Thai speakers had most problems in learning Tone 2 and Tone 3 in Chinese.According to this,We design the experiment in perception of these two tones.Finally,We find that all subjects are influenced by syllabic length,inflection point.But advanced level Thai speakers are not influenced by creaky voice.In general,advanced level Thai speakers verge on native speakers,their production are related to their perception.The fourth chapter: errors analysis and teaching advice.Based on the research above,We try to figure out the reasons of acquisition errors and to propose teaching advice.