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This study examined the identification and production of English consonants by Greek learners of English. Consonant identification was examined in quiet and in two types of noise, a competing talker and an 8-speaker babble. Consonant production was assessed by having English listeners identify the English consonants produced by Greek speakers. Greek speakers achieved higher identification scores in quiet than in noise and the 8-speaker babble had a more detrimental effect in their scores than the competing speaker. Difficulties with specific English consonants were not always similar across modalities; some consonants proved easy to identify but difficult to produce and vice versa.

Within the AM model of intonational phonology, nuclear rather than prenuclear pitch accents typically monopolize our interest as the purported pivots for meaning distinctions among utterances. This paper compares, through one production and two perception experiments, the prenuclear field in statements versus polar questions in Greek, which can be string identical, differing only in intonation. Systematic differences in the prenuclear pitch accents of these two utterance types were found in both their peak alignment and scaling. Moreover, identification and discrimination experiments showed that listeners were attuned to these differences. These results underline the importance of research on the phonetics and phonology of prenuclear pitch accents and their contribution to the meaning of utterances.

Within the AM model of intonational phonology, nuclear rather than prenuclear pitch accents typically monopolize our interest as the purported pivots for meaning distinctions among utterances. This paper compares, through one production and two perception experiments, the prenuclear field in statements versus polar questions in Greek, which can be string identical, differing only in intonation. Systematic differences in the prenuclear pitch accents of these two utterance types were found in both their peak alignment and scaling. Moreover, identification and discrimination experiments showed that listeners were attuned to these differences. These results underline the importance of research on the phonetics and phonology of prenuclear pitch accents and their contribution to the meaning of utterances.

The present study employed high-variability phonetic training (multiple words spoken by multiple talkers) to improve the identification of English consonants by native speakers of Greek. The trainees completed five sessions of identification training with feedback for seven English consonants (contrasting voiced vs. voiceless stops and alveolar vs. postalveolar fricatives) each consisting of 196 trials with a different English speaker in each session. Another group of Greek speakers served as controls, i.e. completed the pre-/post-test but received no training. Pre-/post-tests included English consonant identification in quiet and notice. In the noise condition, participants identified consonants in the presence of a competing English speaker at a signal-to-noise ratio of -2dB. The results showed that training significantly improved English consonant perception for the group that received training but not for the control group in both quiet and noise. The results add to the existing evidence that supports the effectiveness of the high-variability approach to second-language segmental training

This study investigated English consonant identification by Greek listeners and the role of phonological short-term memory (PSTM) in listeners’ identification ability. Twenty Greek university students who had received formal instruction in English identified 24 English consonants (embedded in VCV syllables) presented in quiet and in two noise types, a competing talker at a signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of -6dB and an 8-speaker babble at an SNR of -2dB. Participants’ PSTM was assessed via a serial non-word recognition task in Greek. The results showed that identification scores in quiet were significantly higher than in noise. There was no difference in scores between the two noise conditions. PSTM correlated with English consonant identification in quiet and in the two types of noise; listeners with greater PSTM capacity were also better in identifying English consonants in quiet and noise, a finding that extends previous research in quiet to L2 perception in adverse listening conditions. English consonant confusion patterns are interpreted as caused by a combination of first-language interference (at both the phonetic and phonological levels) and spectral/articulatory factors.

This study investigated English consonant identification by Greek listeners and the role of phonological short-term memory (PSTM) in listeners’ identification ability. Twenty Greek university students who had received formal instruction in English identified 24 English consonants (embedded in VCV syllables) presented in quiet and in two noise types, a competing talker at a signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of -6dB and an 8-speaker babble at an SNR of -2dB. Participants’ PSTM was assessed via a serial non-word recognition task in Greek. The results showed that identification scores in quiet were significantly higher than in noise. There was no difference in scores between the two noise conditions. PSTM correlated with English consonant identification in quiet and in the two types of noise; listeners with greater PSTM capacity were also better in identifying English consonants in quiet and noise, a finding that extends previous research in quiet to L2 perception in adverse listening conditions. English consonant confusion patterns are interpreted as caused by a combination of first-language interference (at both the phonetic and phonological levels) and spectral/articulatory factors.