• search hit 1 of 0
Back to Result List

Second language ability and emotional prosody perception

  • The present study examines the effect of language experience on vocal emotion perception in a second language. Native speakers of French with varying levels of self-reported English ability were asked to identify emotions from vocal expressions produced by American actors in a forced-choice task, and to rate their pleasantness, power, alertness and intensity on continuous scales. Stimuli included emotionally expressive English speech (emotional prosody) and non-linguistic vocalizations (affect bursts), and a baseline condition with Swiss-French pseudo-speech. Results revealed effects of English ability on the recognition of emotions in English speech but not in non-linguistic vocalizations. Specifically, higher English ability was associated with less accurate identification of positive emotions, but not with the interpretation of negative emotions. Moreover, higher English ability was associated with lower ratings of pleasantness and power, again only for emotional prosody. This suggests that second language skills may sometimesThe present study examines the effect of language experience on vocal emotion perception in a second language. Native speakers of French with varying levels of self-reported English ability were asked to identify emotions from vocal expressions produced by American actors in a forced-choice task, and to rate their pleasantness, power, alertness and intensity on continuous scales. Stimuli included emotionally expressive English speech (emotional prosody) and non-linguistic vocalizations (affect bursts), and a baseline condition with Swiss-French pseudo-speech. Results revealed effects of English ability on the recognition of emotions in English speech but not in non-linguistic vocalizations. Specifically, higher English ability was associated with less accurate identification of positive emotions, but not with the interpretation of negative emotions. Moreover, higher English ability was associated with lower ratings of pleasantness and power, again only for emotional prosody. This suggests that second language skills may sometimes interfere with emotion recognition from speech prosody, particularly for positive emotions.show moreshow less

Download full text files

  • phr503.pdfeng
    (877KB)

    SHA-1: 2a178bf7eb9b02d8e7edf38de63aacd526f0f1cb

Export metadata

Additional Services

Search Google Scholar Statistics
Metadaten
Author details:Anjali BhataraORCiD, Petri LaukkaORCiD, Natalie Boll-AvetisyanORCiDGND, Lionel Granjon, Hillary Anger Elfenbein, Tanja Bänziger
URN:urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-411860
DOI:https://doi.org/10.25932/publishup-41186
ISSN:1866-8364
Title of parent work (English):Postprints der Universität Potsdam : Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe
Publication series (Volume number):Zweitveröffentlichungen der Universität Potsdam : Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe (503)
Publication type:Postprint
Language:English
Date of first publication:2019/01/18
Publication year:2016
Publishing institution:Universität Potsdam
Release date:2019/01/18
Tag:basic emotions; language; models; recognition; recognizing emotions; speech; vocalizations
Issue:503
Number of pages:13
Organizational units:Humanwissenschaftliche Fakultät
DDC classification:5 Naturwissenschaften und Mathematik / 50 Naturwissenschaften / 500 Naturwissenschaften und Mathematik
6 Technik, Medizin, angewandte Wissenschaften / 61 Medizin und Gesundheit / 610 Medizin und Gesundheit
Peer review:Referiert
Publishing method:Open Access
Grantor:Public Library of Science (PLOS)
License (German):License LogoCC-BY - Namensnennung 4.0 International
Accept ✔
This website uses technically necessary session cookies. By continuing to use the website, you agree to this. You can find our privacy policy here.