Research on language learners' attention suggests that manipulating attention is beneficial in the language learning process as it facilitates the "noticing" of specific linguistic aspects. The current study investigated the effects of directing learners' attention to segments and prosody in English phonetic training. Korean learners of…

Despite the importance that learners must place on using prosody appropriately in EIL interaction, pragmatic functions of prosody have been largely disregarded in teaching materials and classroom instruction (Nikolic, 2018). Moreover, with a recent change in classroom paradigms instigated by the global development of educational technologies and…

Perceptual grouping is fundamental to many auditory processes. The Iambic-Trochaic Law (ITL) is a default grouping strategy, where rhythmic alternations of duration are perceived iambically (weak-strong), while alternations of intensity are perceived trochaically (strong-weak). Some argue that the ITL is experience dependent. For instance, French…

Infants perceive intonation contrasts early in development in contrast to lexical stress but similarly to lexical pitch accent. Previous studies have mostly focused on pitch height/direction contrasts; however, languages use a variety of pitch features to signal meaning, including differences in pitch timing. In this study, we investigate infants'…

Songbirds and humans share many parallels in vocal learning and auditory sequence processing. However, the two groups differ notably in their abilities to recognize acoustic sequences shifted in absolute pitch (pitch height). Whereas humans maintain accurate recognition of words or melodies over large pitch height changes, songbirds are…

Sequences of notes contain several different types of pitch cues, including both absolute and relative pitch information. What factors determine which of these cues are used when learning about tone sequences? Previous research suggests that infants tend to preferentially process absolute pitch patterns in continuous tone sequences, while other…