Bilinguals Speech Perception

One s native language influences how speech sounds§are perceived. For example, the English d is§perceived as t by native Spanish speakers. This§fact suggests that bilinguals speakers may develop§double phonemic boundaries for speech sounds that§have equal acoustic information but different meaning§in each of the languages they speak. The goal of the§present book was to test the double phonemic boundary§in bilingual speakers of Spanish and English.§Bilinguals participated in two language contexts one§was in English and one was in. In each language§context two measures were done: One measure involved§pressing a response button when a repetitive§background d sound changed to t . The second§measure involved assessing the brain activity§associated to the sound change. The results showed§that the underlying neural mechanisms associated§between stimulus and response did change between§language contexts even though the behavioral§responses did not change dramatically. This book§sheds some light in how language contexts affect§phonetic judgments in bilinguals and monolinguals,§and how language contexts affects the underlying§neural mechanism associated with speech discrimination. One s native language influences how speech sounds§are perceived. For example, the English d is§perceived as t by native Spanish speakers. This§fact suggests that bilinguals speakers may develop§double phonemic boundaries for speech sounds that§have equal acoustic information but different meaning§in each of the languages they speak. The goal of the§present book was to test the double phonemic boundary§in bilingual speakers of Spanish and English.§Bilinguals participated in two language contexts one§was in English and one was in. In each language§context two measures were done: One measure involved§pressing a response button when a repetitive§background d sound changed to t . The second§measure involved assessing the brain activity§associated to the sound change. The results showed§that the underlying neural mechanisms associated§between stimulus and response did change between§language contexts even though the behavioral§responses did not change dramatically. This book§sheds some light in how language contexts affect§phonetic judgments in bilinguals and monolinguals,§and how language contexts affects the underlying§neural mechanism associated with speech discrimination.