Perception of Nonnative-accented Sentences by 5- to 8-Year-olds and Adults: The Role of Phonological Processing Skills

Abstract

To acquire language and successfully communicate in multicultural and multilingual societies, children must learn to understand speakers with various accents and dialects. This study investigated adults' and 5- to 8-year-old children's perception of native- and nonnative-accented English sentences in noise. Participants' phonological memory and phonological awareness were assessed to investigate factors associated with individual differences in word recognition. Although both adults and children performed less accurately with nonnative talkers than native talkers, children showed greater performance decrements. Further, phonological memory was more closely tied to perception of native talkers whereas phonological awareness was more closely related to perception of nonnative talkers. These results suggest that the ability to recognize words produced in unfamiliar accents continues to develop beyond the early school-age years. Additionally, the linguistic skills most related to word recognition in adverse listening conditions may differ depending on the source of the challenge (i.e., noise, talker, or a combination).

Keywords: Foreign accent; development; phonological processing; speech perception.