Rhythmic Abilities Correlate with L2 Prosody Imitation Abilities in Typologically Different Languages.

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Science
• Linguistics
• Music Cognition

Background:

• The link between musical rhythm and speech prosody is well-established.
• However, its role in second language (L2) acquisition remains underexplored.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the predictive relationship between musical rhythmic skills and L2 speech prosody production.
• To determine if musical and linguistic rhythmic competences influence L2 prosody realization.

Main Methods:

• Assessed musical and linguistic rhythmic skills in 23 native French speakers learning English (L2).
• Utilized perception and production tests for both music and language tasks.
• Focused on reproducing L2 English sentences with specific stress patterns.

Main Results:

• Participants struggled with penultimate accent placement in L2 English.
• Rhythm production abilities significantly predicted accuracy in reproducing phonologically disfavored stress patterns.
• Musical rhythmic sequence reproduction accuracy correlated with L2 prosody production success.

Conclusions:

• Musical rhythmic proficiency is a key predictor of L2 speech prosody acquisition.
• Enhanced rhythmic skills may facilitate the learning of unfamiliar L2 stress patterns.
• This study highlights the transferability of rhythmic abilities from music to language learning.