Contextual effect in second language perception and production of Mandarin tones

Abstract A robust contextual effect is well documented in native tone perception and production but less well studied in non-native speech. The current study examined English-speaking learners’ Mandarin tone perception and production with varying preceding and following tones. Fifteen intermediate-level learners performed an Identification and a Reading task with disyllabic stimuli encompassing various tone combinations. The results revealed that the learners’ accuracy rates and error patterns varied in the initial and final position as well as in different tonal environments. For example, the learners predominantly misidentified T3 as T4 in the initial position when the following tone was T1, but rarely made such an error in the final position. In the Reading task, on the other hand, the learners frequently misproduced T3 as T2 in the final position, but often misproduced T2 as T3 in the initial position, especially when the following tone was T1. The learners’ overall accuracy and error rates in Identification correlated with those in Reading, indicating comparable tone perception and production abilities. However, there were some significant differences between perception and production with regard to T3. These findings suggest that the prosodic position and surrounding tones both have a significant effect on the learners’ performance with L2 tones, and that the effect differs in perception and production.