From L2 acquisition to L1 restructuring: Phonotactics in perception and production

Jennifer Cabrelli^1*Jason Cruz¹John Escalante Martínez¹Irene Finestrat²Alicia Luque³

• ¹University of Illinois Chicago, Chicago, United States
• ²Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, United States
• ³Nebrija University, Madrid, Madrid, Spain

Research on L1 perceptual attrition indicates that L2 learners of a language that permits a syllabic structure that is dispreferred in the L1 (a) can acquire the more permissive L2 structure (e.g., Alcorn, 2018; Cabrelli et al., 2019; John & Cardoso, 2017) and (b) such L2 acquisition can yield L1 phonotactic restructuring at the levels of phonetic and phonological processing (e.g., Alcorn, 2018; Cabrelli et al., 2019) as well as production (Alcorn, 2018). In the current study, we examine the production of coda stops in the L1 (Brazilian Portuguese, BP) and adult L2 (English) of a bilingual sample of speakers in an L2 immersion environment. Our first objective is to determine the ways in which these bilinguals' languages interact across the dimensions of perception and production. Specifically, we address the following questions within and between languages, respectively: To what degree of accuracy do these speakers produce coda stops in the L2, and does their L2 perception accuracy predict L2 production accuracy? To what degree of accuracy do these speakers produce coda stops in the L1, and does their L1 perception accuracy predict L1 production accuracy? Finally, does L2 production accuracy predict L1 production accuracy? Our second objective is to model (potentially asymmetric) perception and production relationships in the L1 and L2 after extensive L2 exposure, and to accommodate the variable production patterns attested between as well as within speakers. Data from a syllable concatenation task revealed that participants reliably produced a syllabic target free from epenthesis in English and did so 66% of the time in the L1. However, they avoided coda stops in 19% of L2 productions and 46% of L1 productions, largely favoring epenthesis of the coda stop, followed by palatalization and deletion. While perception did not predict production in either language, L2 production of coda stops predicted L1 production. To model the speakers' asymmetric comprehension and production grammars, variable coda repair strategies, and the variable relationship between the grammars over time, we use the Bidirectional Phonetics and Phonology framework (e.g., Boersma, 2011).