泰籍華語學習者說話清晰度與聲學分析

本研究針對泰籍華語學習者的口語進行評估，以說話清晰度和聲學分析為測量方法，了解泰籍華語學習者在聲學訊號和說話清晰度的表現。同時，探討聲學特徵和清晰度兩者間的關聯，找出影響清晰度主要的聲學參數，以探知造成學習者清晰度降低的因素。本研究以二十名在台灣學習華語之泰籍學習者為研究對象，二十名母語者為參照組，再由六十名母語者進行聽知覺評分，採項目辨識法作為詞語清晰度的評分方式，語句和短文清晰度以視覺類比結合直接大小估計法作為清晰度的評估方式。以十二項最小語音對比的雙音節語詞，作為說話清晰度與聲學分析的材料。雙音節語詞包括「前後元音」、「展圓唇元音」、「高低元音」、「送氣與否塞擦音」、「送氣與否塞音」、「擦音與塞擦音」、「擦音與塞音」、「舌尖前音與舌尖後音」、「塞音部位」、「平調與升調」、「平調與降調」及「二聲及三聲」華語語音對比。此外，也以十個語句和一篇短文作為不同層次口語溝通的說話清晰度材料，測量其語句和短文清晰度。研究結果顯示泰籍華語學習者在三個不同語言層次的說話清晰度表現，在語詞清晰度表現最佳，而短文和句子清晰度表現較差。學習者清晰度和聲學特徵與母語者相似為：「前後元音」、「高低元音」、「擦音與塞音」。影響清晰度之聲學特徵為：圓唇元音/y/的F2偏差將被判斷為/i/或者/u/；送氣塞擦音的噪音時長較長將被判斷為擦音；轉折點偏差會影響二聲和三聲的清晰度。期許透過本研究之清晰度及聲學分析結果，能對如何提升華語學習者口語溝通能力提供參考。

關鍵字

泰國人；華語語音教學；語音產生；外語口音；二語習得

並列摘要

In this study, the spoken language of Thai Mandarin learners was evaluated. Speech intelligibility and acoustic analysis were used as measurement methods to understand the performance of acoustic signals and speech intelligibility of Thai Mandarin learners. At the same time, the correlation between acoustic parameters and intelligibility is tested to find out the main acoustic parameters that affect intelligibility, so as to detect the factors that cause the learner's intelligibility to decrease. The sample participants tested in this study included twenty Thai learners who study Mandarin in Taiwan. Then, twenty native speakers served as the reference group, and the auditory perception scores were provided by sixty native speakers. Item identification method was used to evaluate word intelligibility. Then, the intelligibility of sentences and passages was determined by the combination of a visual analogue scale and a direct magnitude estimation method. Moreover, two-syllable words with twelve minimum phonetic contrasts were used as materials for speech intelligibility and acoustic analysis. The two-syllable words included: front-back vowel, rounded-unrounded vowel, high-low vowel, aspirated-unaspirated affricate, aspirated-unaspirated stop, fricative and affricate, fricative and stop, retroflex and nonretroflex, place of stop articulation, flat and rising tone, flat and falling tone, and contrasts between tone two and tone three. In addition, ten sentences and a short essay were used as the speaking intelligibility materials for measuring the intelligibility of the sentences and phrases of different levels of oral communication. The study showed that Thai Mandarin learners performed the best in word intelligibility at three different language levels, while they performed quite poor in short passages and sentences. The learners’ intelligibility and acoustic characteristics that are similar to those of native speakers are front-back vowel, high-low vowel, and friction and stop. Moreover, the acoustic characteristics that affect intelligibility are: the F2 deviation of the round-lip vowel /y/ being judged as /i/ or /u/, longer noise duration of the aspiration affricate being judged as a fricative, and the turning point deviation that affects the intelligibility of tone two and tone three. It is hoped that by taking into account the intelligibility and acoustic analysis results of this research, the effectiveness of Chinese learners' oral communication ability will be improved.

並列關鍵字

Thai ； TCL ； speech production ； foreign accent ； second language acquisition

參考文獻

Field, J. (2005). Intelligibility and the listener: The role of lexical stress. TESOL Quarterly, 39(3), 399-423. doi:10.2307/3588487

Smith, L. E., & Nelson, C. L. (1985). International intelligibility of English: directions and resources. World Englishes, 4(3), 333-342. doi:10.1111/j.1467-971X.1985.tb00423.x

一、中文部分