The Effect of Shadowing and the Ability of Japanese EFL Learners to Evaluate L2 English Pronunciation

Abstract

This paper explores two main areas related to Japanese EFL student phonetic production and self-assessment. First, we examine how different types of English practice, shadowing and listening, affect phonetic production (segmental accuracy, rhythm, and intonation). Next, we compare English L1 speaker ratings to student assessments of self-recorded speech production samples and other L2 speaker control samples. Self and L1 ratings showed that the segmental, rhythm, and intonation scores for the shadowing practice group consistently increased, but not in a statistically significant manner. Finally, we found that while L1 and L2 ratings of control samples may be similar, L1 raters consistently gave significantly higher ratings to student speech samples than students who rated their own samples.