This study investigates the acoustic realizations of English phonemic contrasts by Korean EFL learners, comparing their productions with those of native English speakers. Focusing on the segmentally correct production, the research aims to determine if Korean learners' acoustic properties align with those of native speakers, influenced by second…

University classrooms are increasingly populated by students with diverse nationalities and native languages (L1). The growing number of students in English-led classrooms who speak English as a second or lower language (L2) may face added difficulties in understanding the specific task objectives or directions, as explained by native-…

Purpose: This study builds a new system for automatically assessing learners' speech elicited from an oral discourse completion task (DCT), and evaluates the prediction capability of the system with a view to better understanding factors deemed influential in predicting speaking proficiency scores and the pedagogical implications of the system.…

This study explored how the first language (L1) influences discourse marker use in second language (L2) speech. Some studies (e.g., Liu, 2013; Sankoff et al., 1997) have addressed the issue of L1 transfer of discourse markers in L2 speech, suggesting that non-native speakers' L1 use may influence the frequency and usage of English discourse…

A writer's L1 is generally believed to influence their L2 English writing significantly. However, the extent to which L1 backgrounds influence Asian learners' L2 English writing has not been wholly elucidated due to the lack of data covering various learners in Asia. Therefore, this study analysed more than one-million-word essays written by 2,318…

For many sociolinguists, the issue of shyness and hesitation phenomenon has been problematic for Japanese L1 and L2 speakers, particularly in gendered interactions. Over the past decade, more Japanese are shunning conversations, relationships, and isolating themselves, which is accelerating the demographic crisis in Japan. Thus, this paper focuses…

This article discusses the interchangeability of three self-report measures for reading anxiety. Despite their differences in target constructs, the three scales have been used for similar lines of research. After computing shared variance between the target scales and examining the behavior of anxiety indexes in relation to the amount of graded…

This study was undertaken to identify the sociolinguistic competence of the foreign national college students of the selected universities in Dagupan City for the academic year 2015-2016. The selected universities are University of Pangasinan -- PHINMA, University of Luzon, and Lyceum Northwestern University. Relative to the foregoing objective,…

The use of first languages (L1) in the English as a Foreign Language (EFL) classroom in Japanese universities is often a source of robust debate. In recent years, there has been an increase in counterarguments against the L2 monolingual EFL classroom and a strengthening of support for L1 usage. This study examines the views of students receiving…

This report discusses why Japan continues to struggle with and appears on the surface to be reluctant to embrace the English language as a medium to conduct business and indeed tourism as opposed to their South East Asian neighbours. The topics covered were the historical context of Japan's isolationist policy, Japan's educational system, and…

The effects of repeated oral reading and timed reading on L2 oral reading fluency were examined among Japanese university students (N = 50) over 12 weeks. Three quasi-experimental groups were used in the study. Group 1 practiced two types of reading: Repeated oral reading with chunking practice and timed reading. Group 2 did timed reading only.…

In an attempt to compare how orthography and phonology interact in EFL learners with different reading abilities, online measures were administered in this study to two groups of university learners, indexed by their reading scores on the Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC). In terms of "accuracy," the less-skilled…