Evaluating the intonation of non-native speakers of English using a computerised test battery

Setter, J. E. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7334-5702, Stojanovik, V. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6791-9968 and Martínez-Castilla, P. (2010) Evaluating the intonation of non-native speakers of English using a computerised test battery. International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 20 (3). pp. 368-385. ISSN 1473-4192 doi: 10.1111/j.1473-4192.2010.00253.x

Abstract/Summary

This study investigates the intonation of Chinese and Arabic learners of English using the computerized test battery Profiling Elements of Prosody for Speech and Communication (PEPS-C). The aims were to ascertain which aspects of intonation are difficult for these learners, and to determine whether PEPS-C can be used to assess the intonation of adult learners. Although some results were significantly different from native-speaker data, raw scores showed that the learner groups performed well in most tasks, which may indicate that the learners' level is too high for the PEPS-C to be useful. However, the PEPS-C did reveal that Arabic learners performed significantly worse at contrastive stress placement, and Chinese learners performed significantly worse assessing likes and dislikes.