Research has shown that gestures can have beneficial effects on second language (L2) pronunciation learning. However, different studies have investigated different gestures and usually either considered effects on learner’s production Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla.Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla.Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla.Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla. or perception Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla.Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla. but hardly both Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla., delivering mixed results. Moreover, previous studies have focused on a small number of L2s such as English Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla., Spanish Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla.Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla., French Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla. Japanese Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla. and Chinese Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla.Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla..  

This study aims to understand whether embodied pronunciation training has beneficial effects on learning the Swedish complementary length contrast (vila ≠ villa). In Swedish, a stressed syllable contains either a long vowel (V:(C)) or a long consonant following a short vowel (VC:). The study will assess adult Swedish learners’ production and perception of this contrast through a pre-/ post-/ delayed post-test design, that is, before and after receiving pronunciation instruction with or without gestures. The instruction phase will consist of a video training learners on the given contrast in three different conditions (between subjects), plus a control group (no training): no gestures (audiovisual speech only), and two gesture conditions, testing two different sets of gestures, where participants will repeat the spoken words while imitating the gestures produced by the instructor in the training video. The gesture conditions are defined based on interviews conducted with nine teachers of Swedish as a second language. During these interviews, teachers were, among others, asked about their use of embodiment and gestures in teaching the Swedish length contrast. Most teachers indicated very similar gestures to illustrate the length contrast, usually involving a metaphorical illustration of temporal length through the depiction of a long horizontal distance in space using both hands (see Fig. 1). Notably, length was usually indicated this way for words with long vowels, rather than for words with long consonants. Words with long consonants (i.e., short vowels) were typically marked with a gesture illustrating brevity, although this was realized differently by different teachers, for instance using a hand clapping gesture, a simple beat gesture (see Fig. 2), or a gesture depicting a short distance (see Fig. 3). In one (of two) gesture conditions, we will thus contrast a length gesture with a brevity gesture, like those seen in Fig. 1 and 3. However, a current debate in the L2 Swedish pronunciation teaching context deals with the issue whether we should characterize the length contrast in terms of long vs. short vowel, or rather in terms of long vowel vs. long consonant. Therefore, in our second set of gestures two length gestures will be used, aligned with the vowel vs. the consonant. 

Learners’ production in the pre- and post-tests will be assessed through native speaker ratings and acoustic analysis. Perception will be measured through an identification task, but also using a visual-world eye-tracking experiment, where the time course of target looking will provide us with a continuous measure of learners’ processing abilities – a novelty in this field of study. In addition, learners will be asked to fill out a language background questionnaire and perform auxiliary tests, such as a memory test or a speech imitation test. We aim to present the final study set-up and some pilot data at the conference.

This initial study is part of a five-year project, which studies effects of embodied pronunciation training in L2 Swedish learning, focusing on two known difficulties: the length contrast (vila ≠ villa) discussed above and the vowel contrast /i/≠/y. We will thus compare a prosodic and a segmental feature, moreover, both in the lab and in an authentic classroom setting. We thus hope to be able to contribute to a broadened as well as deepened understanding of the role of gestures in pronunciation teaching.