An abundance of research has considered how probabilistic information influences processing during both speech production (e.g., Jurafsky, Bell, Gregory, & Raymond, 2001) and perception (e.g., Dahan, Tanenhaus, & Chambers, 2002). My thesis builds on this work by considering whether probabilistic information influences processing by speakers and listeners with impoverished linguistic experience (i.e., second language learners) to the same degree as for first language speakers and listeners. In particular, I investigate differences between these groups regarding their ability to produce discourse-dependent probabilistic reduction (i.e., the reduction of words that have previously been introduced to the discourse) and also use this reduction as a predictive cue during speech perception. I also consider how individual differences in production ability relate to prediction ability, and vice versa.

Gustafson, E. & Goldrick, M. (under review). The role of linguistic experience in the processing of probabilistic information in production.

Gustafson, E. & Goldrick, M. (in prep). Processing probabilistic information during speech perception: The role of linguistic experience.

In this study, we consider how native status, lexical knowledge, and signal degradation influence how French listeners segment an incoming speech stream containing liaison, a phonological process that misaligns word and syllable boundaries. In particular, we investigate how both first language (L1) and second language (L2) French listeners compensate for the syllable-word misalignment associated with liaison while segmenting French speech, and whether compensation-for-liaison strategies differ with decreasing signal-to-noise ratios. Results showed that both L1-French and L2-French listeners generally preferred lexically acceptable parses over those that resulted in a stranded non-word, and both groups gave significantly fewer lexically acceptable parses under harder listening conditions. However, the L2- French listeners demonstrated a pattern of boundary placement that indicated over-compensation for liaison, suggesting that they had successfully acquired, but not fully constrained, rules about liaison.

Gustafson, E., & Bradlow, A. R. (2016). French speech segmentation in liaison contexts by L1 and L2 listeners. Laboratory Phonology: Journal of the Association for Laboratory Phonology, 7(1), 1-34.