Spanish heritage speakers’ processing of lexical stress

Authors

Ramsés Ortín, The University of Texas Rio Grande ValleyFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

8-18-2022

Abstract

This study examines the status of lexical stress in the processing system of heritage speakers of Spanish and whether or not it is influenced by their experience with English. Participants completed an ABX matching task with auditory stimuli differing in the location of stress or in one consonantal sound. Findings reveal that heritage speakers are more accurate in consonant-based trials than in stress-based ones, but only when matching stimuli were non-adjacent, which suggests that their stress-processing strategies pattern more closely with those of native English speakers. Furthermore, dominance and knowledge of Spanish appear to be associated with increased phonological sensibility to stress contrasts. Pedagogical implications are discussed.

Comments

© 2022 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston. Original published version available at https://doi.org/10.1515/iral-2021-0187

Recommended Citation

Ortín, Ramsés. "Spanish heritage speakers’ processing of lexical stress" International Review of Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching, 2022. https://doi.org/10.1515/iral-2021-0187

Publication Title

International Review of Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching

DOI

10.1515/iral-2021-0187