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KMID : 1022420140060010059
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Phonetics and Speech Sciences
2014 Volume.6 No. 1 p.59 ~ p.67
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Sensitive Period of Auditory Perception and Linguistic Discrimination
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Cha Kyung-Whan
Jo Han-Nah
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Abstract
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The purpose of this study is to scientifically examine Kuhl’s (2011), originally Johnson and Newport’s (1989) criticalperiod graph, from a perspective of auditory perception and linguistic discrimination. This study utilizes two types ofexperiments (auditory perception and linguistic phoneme discrimination) with five different age groups (5 years, 6-8 years,9-13 years, 15-17 years, and 20-26 years) of Korean English learners. Auditory perception is examined via ultrasonic soundsthat are commonly used in the medical field. In addition, each group is measured in terms of their ability to discriminateminimal pairs in Chinese. Since almost all Korean students already have some amount of English exposure, the researchersselected phonemes in Chinese, an unexposed foreign language for all of the subject groups. The results are almost completelyin accordance with Kuhl’s critical period graph for auditory perception and linguistic discrimination; a sensitive age is foundat 8. The results show that the auditory capability of kindergarten children is significantly better than that of other students,measured by their ability to perceive ultrasonic sounds and to distinguish ten minimal pairs in Chinese. This finding stronglyimplies that human auditory ability is a key factor for the sensitive period of language acquisition.
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KEYWORD
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auditory perception, sensitive period, linguistic discrimination
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