An Experimental Study On Chinese Learners' Acquisition Development Of English Plosives

As a common category in all languages,plosives is the biggest trouble in the acquisition of a language.Both English and Chinese have six plosives and they are similar to some extent.However,they belong to different language families,and their sound systems are different in nature.Therefore,it is difficult for Chinese learners to acquire English plosives completely.Based on the study methods of plosive pattern theory,this paper explores Chinese learners' acquisition development of English plosives from an acoustic perspective.The Voice Onset Time(VOT)and the time of blocking period(GAP)of English plosives pronounced by Chinese learners at different levels and English native speakers are extracted.The two important parameters are used to construct plosive pattern diagrams.By comparing plosive patterns between Chinese learners at different levels and English native speakers,following questions are explored:1.What characteristics do Chinese learners have in learning English plosives at different stages?2.What's the acquisition order of English plosives learned by Chinese learners?3.What are the factors influencing Chinese EFL learners' acquisition of English plosives?The findings of this study are as following: 1.In general,the acquisition of voiceless plosives is better than voiced plosives.At elementary stage,Chinese EFL learners can master sounds [t] and [k] well.There is difference in the pronunciation of sound [p] between Chinese learners and English native speakers.The category of voiced plosives is not formed and all voiced plosives are pronounced voiceless.At intermediate stage,sound [p] is acquired,but the category of voiced sounds is still not formed.At upper-intermediate stage,the GAP values of sounds [t] and [k] are larger than native speakers'.The phenomenon of hypercorrection occurs.The sub-graph begins to form at this stage.At advanced stage,the hypercorrection of sounds[t] and [k] occurs again.For most learners,the sub-graphs are formed which means the category of voiced plosives are acquired by advanced learners.However,there is still difference between Chinese learners and native speaker in the acquisition of voiced plosives.2.Considering the results of statistic analysis,the general acquisition order of English plosives by Chinese learners is [t],[k]>[p]>[d]>[b]>[g](“>” represents “before”).3.There are two leading factors for the pronunciation errors in the acquisition of English plosives by Chinese learners.Firstly,Chinese learners are greatly influenced by language transfer from their mother tongue.For lower level learners,similar sounds lead to positive transfer while different sounds lead to negative transfer.On the contrary,for upper level learners,similar sounds are much harder to acquire which is called hypercorrection.Secondly,the pronunciation of English plosives by Chinese learners takes on the features of interlanguage,that is,their pronunciation is somewhere between their mother tongue and the target language.This study supported mother tongue transfer theory,Flege's “Speech Learning Model”theory and Selinker's interlanguage theory.Besides,the findings provide references to future relative studies.