The semi-direct speaking test format has limitations, particularly due to its lack of situational authenticity and contextualized input. To address this issue, virtual reality (VR) can be integrated into speaking proficiency tests to enhance authenticity. In this study, a newly designed VR speaking test was administered, and test-takers'…

To be able to assess interactional competence (IC), which believed to be shared knowledge rather than an individual skill, talk in paired speaking tests can be analyzed. Accordingly, this study investigates how L2 speakers of English collaboratively construct turns in paired speaking tests mainly through embodied word search sequences and their…

English proficiency assessments have become a necessary metric for filtering and selecting prospective candidates for both academia and industry. With the rise in demand for such assessments, it has become increasingly necessary to have the automated human-interpretable results to prevent inconsistencies and ensure meaningful feedback to the…

Human raters and machine scoring systems potentially have complementary strengths in evaluating language ability; specifically, it has been suggested that automated systems might be used to make consistent measurements of specific linguistic phenomena, whilst humans evaluate more global aspects of performance. We report on an empirical study that…

The extensive use of automated speech scoring in large-scale speaking assessment can be revolutionary not only to test design and rating, but also to the learning and instruction of speaking based on how students and teachers perceive and react to this technology. However, its washback remained underexplored. This mixed-method study aimed to…

Automatic speech recognition (ASR) technology affords language learners the ability to evaluate their pronunciation accuracy by comparing their intended spoken output with the transcribed text produced by ASR-based dictation applications. However, earlier dictation tools were criticized for producing low level recognition rates for non-native…

Without data on speech accuracy of Vietnamese-English speakers, speech-language pathologists (SLPs) are unable to assess accurately this population for speech sound disorders. This study explored the heretofore uninvestigated speech accuracy and use of Vietnamese-English bilingual individuals residing in the USA. Participants included six…

This study examined accuracy on syllable-final (coda) consonants in newly-learned English-like nonwords to determine whether school-aged bilingual children may be more vulnerable to making errors on English-only codas than their monolingual, English-speaking peers, even at a stage in development when phonological accuracy in productions of…