英語為第二外語學習者對英語口音的態度研究: 以台灣高中為例 - 政大學術集成

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(1)國立政治大學英國語文學系碩士班碩士論文 . 指導教授: 黃怡萍博士 Advisor: Dr. Yi-Ping Huang . 立. 政治大 . ‧ 國. 學. 英語為第二外語學習者對英語口音的態度研究: . ‧. 以台灣高中為例 . y. sit. n. al. er. io. . Nat. Attitudes of EFL Learners towards English Accents: A Survey in Taiwanese High School. . Ch. engchi. i n U. v. . 研究生:游舒淳 Name: SU-TSUN YU 中華民國一〇八年一月 January, 2019. . . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(2) 立. 政治大. ‧. ‧ 國. 學. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. Ch. engchi. i n U. v. DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(3) . Attitudes of EFL Learners towards English Accents: A Survey in Taiwanese High School. A Master’s Thesis Presented to Department of English,. 政治大. National Chengchi University. 立. ‧. ‧ 國. 學 y. sit. Nat. In Partial Fulfillment. n. al. er. io. of the Requirements for the Degree of. Ch. i n U. Master of Arts. engchi. v. by SU-TSUN YU January, 2019. . . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(4) 立. 政治大. ‧. ‧ 國. 學. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. Ch. engchi. i n U. v. DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(5) . To Professor Yi-Ping Huang 獻給我的恩師黃怡萍教授 . 立. 政治大. ‧. ‧ 國. 學. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. Ch. engchi. i n U. v. i . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(6) . Acknowledgements . I am grateful to every person who kindly offered me supports. Above all, I would. like to express my gratitude to my advisor Dr. Yi-Ping Huang, for her supportive mentoring during my thesis writing process. Her continuous guidance and constant. 政治大. feedback guided me through frustration and confusion. I am blessed to have her as my. 立. advisor.. ‧ 國. 學. I would also like to extend my appreciation to my committee members Dr. Chieh-yue Yeh and Dr. Ming-chung Yu for their comments and expertise. Special. ‧. thanks go to Ruby, Caroline and Julia, good friends of mine, helped me distribute my. Nat. sit. y. questionnaire without hesitation. My wholehearted appreciation goes to Patrick and. n. al. er. io. Brad, for their encouragement and joyous moments we have shared together during the process of completing our theses.. Ch. engchi. i n U. v. Finally, I would like to thank my parents and grandparents for their unconditional love and support. They help me through all the hardship with their everlasting love. In no words can I describe my gratefulness to them. Once again, I would like to express my appreciation to those who have encouraged and supported me during the process of writing this thesis. January, 2019. ii . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(7) . TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements ....................................................................................................... ii CHINESE ABSTRACT ................................................................................................. v ABSTRACT................................................................................................................ vii CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION ................................................................................... 1 Background and Motivation .................................................................................................. 1 Research Purpose and Research Questions ........................................................................... 2 Significance of the Study ....................................................................................................... 3 Overview of the Study ........................................................................................................... 3. 政治大 Pronunciation Learning Goal ................................................................................................. 5 立 Importance of Attitude Study: Attitude and Motivation ........................................................ 6. CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW ........................................................................ 5. ‧ 國. 學. Attitude .............................................................................................................................. 7 Motivation ......................................................................................................................... 7. ‧. Attitude and Motivation in the Study ................................................................................ 8 Research on Attitude Study ................................................................................................... 9. Nat. sit. y. Participants in ESL context ............................................................................................... 9. er. io. Participants in EFL context ............................................................................................. 11 Participants from both ESL and EFL countries ............................................................... 13. n. al. Ch. i n U. v. Research on Attitude Study in Taiwan ................................................................................ 15. engchi. CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY ................................................................................ 19 Participants........................................................................................................................... 19 Instrument ............................................................................................................................ 20 A questionnaire about the background information of students ...................................... 21 A questionnaire about accents and learning motivations ................................................ 21 The verbal-guise technique (VGT) .................................................................................. 23 Procedure ............................................................................................................................. 25 Data analysis ........................................................................................................................ 25. CHAPTER 4 RESULTS .............................................................................................. 29 Questionnaire Survey ........................................................................................................... 29 Research Question 1: Attitudes toward Accents ............................................................. 29. . iii . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(8) . Research Question 1: Verbal Guised Technique ............................................................. 31 Research Question 2: Motivations................................................................................... 34 Research Question 2: Background Information .............................................................. 41. CHAPTER 5 DISCUSSION ........................................................................................ 47 RQ1:The Participants’ Learning Goal ................................................................................. 47 RQ1: Motivations Behind Their Learning Goal .................................................................. 48 Common Belief: Native Accent is Perfect ...................................................................... 48 Common Belief: Native Accent is the Ultimate Goal of Learning ................................. 49 Comments from Others ................................................................................................... 50 The Need for Global Communication? ........................................................................... 51 Intelligibility Rather Than Accent ................................................................................... 52. 治政大 RQ2: Factors Related to the Learning Goal ......................................................................... 54 立 Gender ............................................................................................................................. 55 Language Identity ............................................................................................................ 54. ‧ 國. 學. Self-Perceived Proficiency .............................................................................................. 55 Familiarity ....................................................................................................................... 56. ‧. Exposure .......................................................................................................................... 57. CHAPTER 6 CONCLUSION ..................................................................................... 59. y. Nat. sit. Summary .............................................................................................................................. 59. al. er. io. Pedagogical Suggestions ...................................................................................................... 60. n. Identify Students’ Perspectives and Clarify their Perspectives ....................................... 60. Ch. i n U. v. Build Students’ Knowledge for the Varieties of English ................................................ 61. engchi. English as an International Language (EIL) .................................................................... 63 Select Appropriate Teaching Models .............................................................................. 63 Exposure to Different Varieties ....................................................................................... 64 Limitations of the Study & Direction for Future Research.................................................. 65. APPENDIX (Questionnaire) ........................................................................................ 66 REFERENCE............................................................................................................... 70. . iv . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(9) . 國立政治大學英國語文學系碩士班碩士論文提要論文名稱 : 英語為第二外語學習者對英語口音的態度研究:以台灣高中為例指導教授 : 黃怡萍博士 . 立. 研究生 : 游舒淳 . 政治大. ‧ 國. 學. 論文提要內容 : . ‧. 國際上的溝通交流大部分是在非母語人士間(Crystal, 2003; Prodromou, 1997)，. y. Nat. io. sit. 英語學習的目的是為了與不同國家的人士溝通，而非僅限於母語人士，在此情境. n. al. er. 下，國際英語(EIL)反映了應與使用者的不同文化背景，也改變了英語學習者的需求和目標。 . Ch. engchi. i n U. v. 然而在台灣，只有少數的研究探討高中生的發音學習目標，瞭解學生的學習目標有助於發音教學，因此，本研究欲更加了解台灣高中生英語發音的學習目標，檢視他們對待不同英語口音的態度，以及影響他們發音目標設定的相關因素和學習動機，以問卷以及 Verbal-Guised Technique 為研究工具，對 172 位台灣高中生進行研究。在 172 個受試者中，百分之 58 的學生目標是發音和母語人士一樣，剩下的則是著重在提升語言的理解度。Verbal-Guise Technique 的分析結果亦符合發音. . v . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(10) . 目標的結果，顯示受試者對英語母語口音的評價更高。關於影響發音目標選擇的因素，性別和英語能力自評和結果最為相關，結果顯示女性比男性更加渴望追求母語口音，另外受試者對自我英語能力評價越高，就越傾向追母語口音。此外，受試者動機的分析結果指出，學生只要擁有較高的動機，不論是工具 (instrumental)動機或融合(integrative)動機，他們都會更容易將學習母語口音設為. 政治大. 目標。值得一提的是，分析結果也顯示，台灣高中生仍然有視母語人士為學習標. 立. 竿的觀念。 . ‧ 國. 學. 鑑定完學生的觀點後，有助於教師後續的教學活動，首先教師應向學生澄清. sit. y. Nat. 在提升國際溝通時的理解力而非和母語人士一一樣的口音。 . ‧. 追求完美母語口音的觀念，並建立學生對於多元口音的知識，教學活動的目標旨. n. al. er. io. 再者，教師補充多元口音的教材，以及提供學生和國際學生互動的機會，以. i n U. v. 提升學生溝通能力。這樣學生可以有更多接觸不同口音的機會，也能更加尊重世界上不同文化與人民。 . Ch. engchi. 關鍵字：國際英語(EIL)、發音、語言態度、學習目標、學習動機 . . vi . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(11) . ABSTRACT Since the global communication happens mostly among non-native speakers (Crystal, 2003; Prodromou, 1997), English is being learned for international. 政治大. communication rather than communication with native speakers. In this situation,. 立. English as an International Language (EIL) reflects the culture diversity of users with. ‧. ‧ 國. goals.. 學. different culture backgrounds and changes the learners’ pronunciation needs and. However, few studies in Taiwan paid attention to high school students’ learning. Nat. sit. y. goals in pronunciation. Understanding students’ learning goals would be helpful in. n. al. er. io. pronunciation teaching. Therefore, this study aims to explore the issue of Taiwanese. i n U. v. high school students’ learning goals in English pronunciation, and investigate their. Ch. engchi. attitudes towards accents, factors, and motivations contributing to their choices. This study drew data from 172 high school students by using questionnaire and Verbal-Guise Technique. The analysis of 172 responses showed that 58 percent of the students would like to pursue native accents while the rest of them concentrate on the intelligibility. The analysis of Verbal-guised technique (VGT) also corresponds to this result indicating more positive attitudes of the students toward the native accent. As to the four factors that might contribute to their choices in learning goals, gender and self-perceived proficiency were found most related to the results. Female . vii . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(12) . students were more eager to acquire native accents than male students. Besides gender difference, the participants’ self-perceived proficiency would also have an influence on their learning goal in pronunciation. With the levels advancing, the participants would have a tendency to set their goals to be like native speakers. Besides, the results of motivations investigation indicate that if students possess higher motivations, no matter instrumental or integrative, they would have the. 政治大. tendency to pursue native accents. It is worth to note that high school students still. 立. held the belief that native accents were the benchmark of achievement and deserved. ‧ 國. 學. to be complimented.. After identifying their students’ perspectives, it is helpful for teachers to engage. ‧. them for further pedagogical instruction. First of all, teachers should clarify their. y. Nat. sit. belief about the perfection of native accents and further build their knowledge for. n. al. er. io. varieties of English and promote intelligibility in global communication. Moreover,. i n U. v. teachers can supplement them with more resources on other varieties of English and. Ch. engchi. also provide students with different opportunities to interact with international students to promote the participants’ communication abilities. In doing so, students can have more opportunity to get access to different varieties of English and show respect to different cultures and people around the world.. key words: EIL, pronunciation, language attitude, learning goal, learning motivation. . viii . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(13) . CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION This chapter introduces the background and motivation of the current study. Then, the research purposes and questions would be explored in the study and followed by stating the significance of the study in terms of how it may contribute to the understanding of the students’ learning goal in English pronunciation. Finally, an overview of the current study is provided.. 政治大. Background and Motivation. 立. English is viewed as an international language and is widely used in the world.. ‧ 國. 學. Learners used to seek for the norms and standards of English to learn. However, with so many users around the world, English is characterized by its. ‧. variation, which interprets the concept of World Englishes. One of the concerns of. y. Nat. sit. World Englishes is the teaching and learning of English in the EFL context. With a. n. al. er. io. variety of accents in the world, whether students should conform to native norms in. i n U. v. pronunciation has been debated in recent years. In order to understand learners’. Ch. engchi. perspectives about the accents, attitude studies towards accents were also carried out worldwide. Recent research on attitude studies abroad has shown that most of the leaners prefer native varieties than non-native ones (Bernaisch & Koch, 2015; Chiba et al., 1995; Dalton-Puffer et al., Hundt et al., 2015; 1997; McKenzie, 2008; Scales et al., 2006; Tokumoto & Shibata, 2011). However, in Timmis’ study (2002), students and teachers in ESL context expressed a desire to retain their first language accent. In addition, in He and Zhang’ (2010) study, most of the participants in China were content about English with their own accent as long as they can achieve mutual . 1 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(14) . understanding. Although the results are different in the above studies, the influential factors behind the participants’ preference can be concluded as follows: the history of colonization, familiarity, exposure to English, leaners’ self-perceived proficiency, motivation, learning context and gender. These factors provide accessing to analyze learners’ attitudes towards accents, and are the important elements in the methodology of this current study.. Research Purpose and Research Questions Turning to the situation in Taiwan, there were few studies paying attention to. 治政大attitudes are much in the learners’ attitudes towards accents and the results of learners’ 立 same vein. To begin with, Taiwanese learners preferred native speakers to be their. ‧ 國. 學. teachers and viewed native varieties (American English and British English) as the. ‧. target model (Cheng, 2009; Kobayashi, 2008). Besides, there were also studies trying. sit. y. Nat. to prove that after teaching interventions, learners’ attitudes would be more positive. io. er. towards non-native accents (Lee & Wang, 2015; Wong, 2011). Although after teaching, leaners tend to appreciate other accents, more than half of them still set the. al. n. v i n Cofhpronunciation probably norm of native speakers as their goal e n g c h i U because of the competition and peer evaluation in the study (Lee & Wang, 2015). Since. understanding learners’ pronunciation goal can shed lights on teaching, there is a need to investigate Taiwanese learners’ attitudes of learning pronunciation. Previous studies in Taiwan indicated that EFL leaners prefer native accent to others. Most of the studies in Taiwan paid attention to college students’ preference among various accents research. However, the relationship among learners’ pronunciation learning goal, their learning motivation and factors contributing to their choices were less discussed in these studies. Understanding learners’ pronunciation. . 2 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(15) . goal and related perspectives would be guidelines for high school English teachers and thus be helpful in pronunciation instruction. With the purpose in mind, this study concentrates on the following two research questions: 1. Do Taiwanese students prefer the native accents or their own variant as their learning goals? Why do they have this kind of preference (motivation)? 2. What factors might contribute to students' preference? What is the relationship between the participants' choices and these factors (i.e., gender, self-perceived proficiency, familiarity, and exposure to English-speaking countries)?. 立. 政治大. Significance of the Study. ‧ 國. 學. The current study attempts to investigate the learning goal in English. ‧. pronunciation of high school students in Taiwan. Besides, the factors and motivations. sit. y. Nat. related to their choices would be analyzed and discussed. Lastly, pedagogical. io. er. implications in pronunciation would be provided. By probing the issue, high school English teachers can understand students’ perspectives toward accents and can be. al. n. v i n inspired when addressing theCaccent issues in pronunciation instruction. hen gchi U Overview of the Study. This study is divided into the following sections. First, in the literature review part, it focuses on pronunciation learning and explores the shift of the learners’ learning goals in English pronunciation. After that, a review on the importance of attitude studies is introduced, which focused on the relationship between attitudes and motivation and pronunciation learning. Then, research on attitudes studies around the world and then the studies in Taiwan are discussed.. . 3 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(16) . Next, the methodology adopted in the present study will be explained, including the participants, instrument, procedure, and data analysis. Then, the findings of the survey are analyzed and discussed. Finally, further implications for English teaching in Taiwan will be provided. By investigating the participants’ attitudes toward accents and analyzing the related factors and motivations, this study expects to provide pedagogic inspiration in Taiwan.. 立. 政治大. ‧. ‧ 國. 學. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. . Ch. engchi. i n U. v. 4 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(17) . CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW The chapter reviews literature on attitude studies related to the current research. The first section focuses on the pronunciation learning and explores the shift of the learners’ learning goals in English pronunciation. The second section introduces the importance of attitude studies by probing in the concepts of attitude and motivation which are significant in language learning and teaching. The third section reviews research around the world on attitude studies categorized by the learners’ learning. 政治大. contexts into ESL, EFL, and both ESL and EFL. The final section includes the studies conducted in Taiwan. 立. ‧ 國. 學 Pronunciation Learning Goal. ‧. Pronunciation research has been influenced by two major principles, the. y. Nat. sit. nativeness principle and the intelligibility principle. In the realm of pronunciation. n. al. er. io. pedagogy, the former holds that learners should try their best to achieve native-like. i n U. v. accent and the latter holds that learners simply need to be understandable (Levis, 2005).. Ch. engchi. Traditional pronunciation goals encouraging leaners to strive for near-native pronunciation were the dominant paradigm before 1960s. The review by MarinovaTodd et al. (2000) of research on adult acquisition of English found that some adults could achieve native proficiency in pronunciation. But in general, few learners pronounced as well as natives. While “mastery” of pronunciation sounds attractive to many students and teachers even until now, the goal is actually unattainable and unrealistic which not only defeats learners but also frustrates teachers (He and Zhang, 2010; Kirkpatrick, 2007; Levis, 2005; Morley, 1991; Rajadurai, 2001). . 5 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(18) . On the other hand, intelligibility principle recognizes learners can be understandable even with foreign accents. To achieve successful communication doesn’t require native accents. Besides, literatures have found that non-native speakers outnumber the native speakers (Crystal, 1997; Graddol, 1997). Non-native speakers today no longer learn English to communicate primarily with native speakers. Their goals of learning English are for international communication, which is the concept of English as an International Language (EIL). To achieve mutual intelligibility is more emphasized than the nativeness of pronunciation. By adopting a questionnaire of Timmis (2002), which was designed based on the. 治政大 to explore the students’ nativeness and the intelligibility principles, my research aimed 立. learning goal in English pronunciation. To be specific, one section in the questionnaire. ‧ 國. 學. would ask the participants which speaker they would like to be- pronounce English. ‧. just like native speakers or pronounce with Taiwanese accent but communicate. sit. y. Nat. fluently. By answering the question, the students would state their ultimate goal in. io. er. pronunciation. Understanding the students’ performance goals is helpful for the educators to facilitate the pronunciation learning and teaching process accordingly.. al. n. v i n C students’ Furthermore, to probe the issue in the behaviors, it is crucial to h e n glearning chi U. examine the students’ language attitude, which may influence their attainment of the language.. Importance of Attitude Study: Attitude and Motivation As Oroujlou and Vahedi (2011) put it : “motivation and attitude provides primary impetus to initiate learning language 2 (hereafter L2) and later the driving force to sustain the long and often tedious learning process”(p.994). The comparison of attitude and motivation is that attitude is a combination of beliefs, and motivation is. . 6 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(19) . the impetus for doing something. The two terms are interrelated because the beliefs can be the reason for doing something. Previous studies also indicated attitude will have a positive impact on motivation to learn (Lennartsson, 2008; Jain & Sidhu, 2013) Therefore, understanding the attitudes and motivation of language learners is vital to implement language learning and teaching.. Attitude Attitude is related to the attainment of language learning. For instance, in Oller et al.’s (1977) study, Chinese graduate students did better on their tests if they rated. 治政大 Therefore, for educators, Americans higher in terms of their positive personalities. 立 better understanding of the attitude and motivation of learners can assist them to. ‧ 國. 學. design curriculums and programs that produce more successful learners (Miraj et al.,. ‧. 2008).. sit. y. Nat. In terms of learning pronunciation, Suter (1976) found that the participants who. io. er. were more “concerned” about their pronunciation (p.249) had better pronunciation attainment in learning English as a second language. In addition, Elliot (1995) also. al. n. v i n C htoward native or non-native found that the students’ attitudes pronunciation were engchi U related to their acquisition of their target language pronunciation.. Motivation On the other hand, motivation, defined by Gardner (1985), is “the extent to which an individual works or strives to learn the language because of a desire to do so and the satisfaction experienced in this activity”(p.10). Motivation can be further categorized into integrative, learning a language because one strongly identifies with the target group and wants to become one of the target language community, and. . 7 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(20) . instrumental, learning a language concerned with the pragmatic and utilitarian reasons, such as for academic or better pay (Gardner & Lambert, 1972). They also mentioned that students with integrative motivation would work harder to develop communication skills in the second language learning. Therefore, in the study, the attitude of the learners towards different accents will be examined and their motivation behind will also be discussed to shed lights on the pronunciation pedagogy.. Attitude and Motivation in the Study. 治政大be known in the study Attitudes of the participants towards English accents can 立. by analyzing the results of the verbal-guised technique and the questionnaire. The. ‧ 國. 學. purpose of conducting the verbal-guised technique is to elicit the participants’. ‧. spontaneous reactions towards English accents. After listening to the two recordings,. sit. y. Nat. one is American accent and the other is Taiwanese accent, the participants would be. io. er. asked to rate according to the 16 traits provided such as friendly, educated and competent. The higher ratings they gave indicated the more positive attitudes they had. n. al. towards that particular accent.. Ch. engchi. i n U. v. Moreover, the learners’ attitudes toward English accents can also be investigated in the questionnaire of the study. After the participants chose their learning goal, they would be asked to provide their reasons. There are eight reasons provided in the questionnaires and two of the statements “Other people may think I am good at English.” and “Native accent is the perfect accent” represent the common belief towards accents. By understanding whether the participants hold these beliefs, their language attitudes towards accents can be known. According to Tokumoto & Shibata (2011), the particular language attitudes were learned and established in social. . 8 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(21) . environment, such as by hearing from others. The rest of the six statements in the questionnaire were motivations of the participants. Three of them were categorized into integrative motivations and the others were instrumental motivations, which would be discussed later in the section of methodology.. Research on Attitude Study The literature on attitude studies abroad has revealed that native varieties tend to receive higher evaluations than non-native ones (Bernaisch & Koch, 2015; Chiba et al.,. 治政 1995; Dalton-Puffer et al., 1997; Hundt et al., 2015;大 Jenkins, 2005; McKenzie, 2008; 立 Scales et al., 2006; Sifakis and Sogari, 2005; Tokumoto & Shibata, 2011; Uygun,. ‧ 國. 學. 2013). Only few exceptions have mixed and even opposite results (He and Zhang,. ‧. 2010; Timmis, 2002). According to the different learning context, the following. sit. y. Nat. literature review of attitude studies will be discussed in the order: participants in ESL. io. er. context, participants in EFL context, and participants coming from both ESL and EFL countries. Finally, the studies investigating the attitudes of the participants in Taiwan. n. al. will be explored.. Ch. engchi. i n U. v. Participants in ESL context In the ESL context, research showed that people in India and Fiji both evaluate British English positively than other accents. For example, Bernaisch and Koch (2015) explored Indian English speakers’ attitudes towards Indian English, British English, American English, and Sri Lankan English with 13 bipolar pairs arranged on a six-point semantic differential scale. The participants viewed British English as most favorable while Sri Lankan English the least. However, if the descriptors on the. . 9 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(22) . bipolar scales are examined respectively, the results showed that among the varieties, British English received much higher evaluation than others on the descriptors such as “educated,” “smart,” “formal,” “serious”, and “sophisticated”. However, in terms of “friendly” and “humble”, British English didn’t receive the highest scores. Instead, Indian English was evaluated positively in these two descriptors. Therefore, although the result displayed the overall positive attitudes toward British English, different aspects of attitudes should also be investigated to explore the participants’ attitudes deeper. In addition to India, a questionnaire-based research (Hundt, Zipp & Huber, 2015). 治政 indicated that Fiji citizens had strong preference for British大 English and considered it 立 the best English-speaking country, the most pleasant variety and the norm in. ‧ 國. 學. institutional context. Among other varieties being investigated, American English,. ‧. second to British English, was favored over other accents in Australia, New Zealand,. sit. y. Nat. South Africa and Fiji. In this study, Fiji citizens preferred the inner circle varieties of. io. er. English to the local varieties.. The above studies in India and Fiji also revealed that colonization and gender. al. n. v i n differences are influential factors. InCboth British English received higher h ecases, ngchi U. evaluation than other varieties and it may reflect the influence of colonial power. As Karchu (1986) puts it: “the historical development of non-native varieties of English is closely related to colonisation. Attitudinally, the colonisers’ English became the preferred norm once English was introduced in the linguistic network of a country” (p.88). Colonization has an important effect on the positive attitudes of the colonized towards English accents. Although India and Fiji were affected by the colonization in the preference of British English, gender differences seem to display disagreement between these two studies. In Fiji, male respondents regarded the local variety, Fiji. . 10 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(23) . English, as both “best” and “most pleasant” more often than female respondents (Hundt, Zipp & Huber, 2015). However, in India, young (19 to 24 years old) female have more positive attitudes towards their local variety, Indian English (Bernaisch and Koch, 2015).. Participants in EFL context Similar to the studies in the ESL setting, participants in the EFL settings such as Austria and Japan also displayed strong preference for native accents. In Austria, in order to shed light on pronunciation instruction, Dalton-Puffer,. 治政 Kaltenboeck and Simit (1997) tested the attitudes of大 university students towards three 立. native accents RP (Received Pronunciation), near-RP, and GA (General America) and. ‧ 國. 學. two non-native accents of English in Austria. The respondents showed that British. ‧. English is the highest valued in Austria: more than two-thirds of the respondents. sit. y. Nat. attempted to learn RP. Besides, under the instruction of the questionnaire, they. io. er. considered the speaker with RP accent the most qualified for publishing audio books. In the case of Austria, researchers concluded that familiarity and exposure played. al. n. v i n C h preference of RP. a crucial role in the overwhelming e n g c h i U The respondents positively rated the accent that they were familiar with at school and/or during stays in English. speaking countries. Moreover, students growing under the EFL context reflect more rigid stereotypes than those who have spent time in English-speaking countries. In Japan, the attitudes of Japanese university students were investigated towards six varieties of English (McKenzie, 2008). The result suggested that in terms of “status” (intelligent, confident, fluent, clear), respondents favored standard and non-standard varieties of UK and US English. On the other hand, when “solidarity” (gentle, pleasant, funny, modest) is taken into consideration, heavily-accented. . 11 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(24) . Japanese English received higher evaluation. Besides the two facets, gender, self-perceived proficiency in English, and previous exposure to English had significant influence on the respondents’ attitudes. In McKenzie’s (2008) research, female respondents, respondents who regarded themselves as high proficiency leaners, and respondents with (more than three months) experience travelling to English countries all rated three varieties of UK and US English more positively. Parallel to McKenzie’s (2008) study, another research in Japan also displayed university students’ preference to the native accents, American and British accents, rather than non-native accents, accents in Japan, Hong Kong, Sri Lanka and Malaysia. 治政大 with more instrumental (Chiba et al, 1995). The results also indicated that participants 立 motivation, that means who agree with the statement “As long as it is understood,. ‧ 國. 學. incorrect English is acceptable”, have more positive attitudes towards non-native. ‧. English accents. Furthermore, the Japanese participants could easily identified native. sit. y. Nat. accents compared to Japanese and other Asian varieties. The researchers concluded. io. er. that familiarity with a particular accent is also relevant to accepting accents. Moreover, to explore the appropriate models and norms in China’s ELT. al. n. v i n classroom, a study was conducted toCunderstand attitudes of non-English major h e n gthe chi U university students and teachers of college English towards standard English and China English (He & Zhang, 2010). The survey questionnaire was adapted from Timmis (2002) and the result showed that more than half of the participants could accept their Chinese accent as long as they can communicate clearly. The half of the participants believed that English was a tool for communication therefore the native accent was not necessary. Also, 34 percent of the participants had a strong language identity and wanted to be identified through their Chinese accent.. . 12 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(25) . Participants from both ESL and EFL countries In addition to the attitude studies conducted in outer and expanding circles, Timmis’ (2002) study investigated 400 learners in more than 45 countries. On the contrary to He and Zhang’s (2010) study, Timmis found that over two-thirds, 67 percent, of the students preferred native accent. The only exceptions were the students from three inner and outer circle countries- South Africa, Pakistan and India. 64 percent of them hope to retain the accent of their countries. However, the researcher concluded that, on average, “There is still some desire among students to conform to native speaker norms”(p.248) and wondered whether the teachers have the right to. 治政大their awareness towards World “politically re-educate”(p.249) the students and raise 立 English.. ‧ 國. 學. Like in Timmis’ (2002) study, the attitudes of more than one ethnic group were. ‧. examined in Tokumoto and Shibata’s (2011) study. They explored the attitudes of. sit. y. Nat. university students from Japan, South Korea, and Malaysia toward their L1-accented. io. er. English. The result showed that Japanese participants were the most anxious for the intelligibility of their accented English. To lesser degree than Japanese, the Korean. al. n. v i n Ch participants also evaluated Korean-accented negatively. Unlike students in e n g c English hi U. Japan and Korea, Malaysian students desired to maintain their own accent and more confident in their own variety of English. The attitudinal differences among the three countries may result form the pedagogical context according to Tokumoto and Shibata (2011). English is taught as a foreign language in both Japan and Korea while as a second language in Malaysia. In Japan and Korea English is rarely used outside of the classroom while in Malaysia, English is an official language and serves as lingua franca among Malays, Chinese and Indians. However, both in the EFL settings, the Korean participants evaluated. . 13 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(26) . their accented English more positively compared to the Japanese. The difference can be counted on the English education policy and social movement in South Korea. The government wanted to improve students’ ability to explain their culture to foreigners. As for the social movement, a new variety of English, Korean English, is used in English newspapers in the country. Because of these factors, the attitudinal differences exist among these three ethnic groups. Previous attitude studies displayed that most of the participants preferred the native varieties of English (Bernaisch & Koch, 2015; Chiba et al., 1995; DaltonPuffer et al., 1997; Jenkins, 2005; Hundt et al., 2015; McKenzie, 2008; Scales et al.,. 治政大Uygun, 2013). However, 2006; Sifakis and Sogari, 2005; Tokumoto & Shibata, 2011; 立 in Timmis’ study (2002), most of the participants preferred native accents while the. ‧ 國. 學. participants from ESL context didn’t. Also, He and Zhang (2010) concluded that more. ‧. than half of the Chinese participants didn’t mind their Chinese accent.. sit. y. Nat. The factors behind the participants’ preference were examined in these studies.. io. er. To begin with, colonization in Fiji and India played an essential role in the participants’ preference for British English (Bernaisch and Koch, 2015; Hundt, Zipp. al. n. v i n Cparticular & Huber, 2015). Familiarity with the was also an important factor h e n gaccent chi U. but the term was explained differently in the studies in Austria, Japan, and Turkey- the first indicating familiarity at school, and the latter two meaning the degree to be recognized (Chiba et al.,1995; Dalton-Puffer et al., 1997; Uygun, D. 2013) Besides, more exposure to English speaking countries (Dalton-Puffer et al., 1997; McKenzie, 2008), and participants with more confidence in their proficiency (McKenzie, 2008) would also affect their attitudes towards accents. Moreover, the participants with instrumental motivation, that is, using English as a communication tool (Chiba et al., 1995; He & Zhang, 2010) with strong language identity (He& Zhang, 2010), and with. . 14 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(27) . reality concerned (He & Zhang, 2010, Timmis, 2002) would show more tolerance to native variety of English. Furthermore, Tokumoto and Shibata (2011) indicated that the difference of the context, ESL or EFL, the social movement, and the educational policy also played an important part in the participants’ preference. Finally, gender difference also plays a crucial but diverse role in the participants’ attitudes. In the study conducted in Fiji and Japan, female valued native accents higher than male (Hundt, Zipp & Huber, 2015; McKenzie, 2008), while in India, Bernaisch, and Koch (2015) the researchers found the opposite result. The above studies reveal that a variety of factors and motivation had an influence. 治政大and the attitudes are correlated on the participants’ attitudes towards English accents 立. to language learners’ leaning. If leaners have a positive evaluation towards their own. ‧ 國. 學. accented English, they would be less anxious when speaking in English (Tokumoto. ‧. and Shibata, 2011). Therefore, understanding the participants, learning goal of. sit. y. Nat. pronunciation is crucial-whether they prefer to have a native accent or their own. io. er. accented English but with global intelligibility (Groom, 2012; He & Zhang, 2010; Scales et al., 2006; Timmis, 2002). In addition to learners, teachers’ perspectives also. al. n. v i n C h their expectationUon students in pronunciation require investigation to understand engchi (Timmis, 2002; He & Zhang, 2010).. Research on Attitude Study in Taiwan Although English Language Teaching is prevalent in Taiwan, few studies focus on the attitudes of English language learners towards varieties of English. Attitude studies about Taiwanese learners showed that leaners preferred native speakers to be their teachers. For example, Cheng (2009) investigated elementary students’ attitudes about the accents of their English teachers by listening to two accents: General. . 15 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(28) . American and Chinese English. The result indicated that almost two thirds of the learners preferred the native speaker to be their language teachers. Similarly, Kobayashi (2008) conducted a study in Philippines on Taiwanese students participating in the language program. With a questionnaire on the attitudes towards second language varieties of English, the result indicated that participants still regarded native varieties (American English and British English) as the target model. They didn’t choose the inner circle countries but Philippines as their learning site because of the low cost and geographical proximity. However, almost all participants mentioned the difficulties to get used to the Philippine teachers’ accent. Therefore, the. 治政 researcher suggested Taiwanese learners’ more exposure to大 L2 varieties of English 立 and to teacher-training institutions in Taiwan for courses in World English and. ‧ 國. 學. English as an International Language.. ‧. Although language learners in Taiwan still seek the native norms as their. sit. y. Nat. pronunciation model, other studies (Lee & Wang, 2015; Wong, 2011) proved that. io. er. after teaching interventions, learners’ attitudes would be more positive towards non-native accents. Wong (2011) compared the attitudes of Taiwanese university. al. n. v i n C h American English, students towards three varieties of English: e n g c h i U Indian English and Taiwan Mandarin-accented English. The result from the attitudinal questionnaire. revealed that American English received the most positive evaluation while the Indian English the most negative. However, after the instruction on Indian English from the perspective of World Englishes, students tended to appreciate the different varieties of English. Lee and Wang (2015) also conducted a study on 85 students from two universities in Taiwan and found out that after teaching intervention students attitudes toward native norms would change. After listening to the recording of speakers from. . 16 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(29) . America, India and Vietnam, students were required to complete an attitude questionnaire. The result indicated that the participants viewed American English most positively. With the understanding of their attitudes, the researchers then conducted teaching intervention, in which students had to write an English dialogue and videotaped their performance as a group of four. Then, they would receive peer evaluation and discussed their work in the class. According to the researchers, after teaching interventions, students tended to appreciate other varieties of English. The number of students who considered the standard pronunciation was important decreased from 87 percent to 74 percent. However, the native norm was still the goal. 治政大 who wanted to sound like of students and it was reflected by the number of students 立 native speakers increasing from 54 percent to 61 percent. Therefore, mixed results. ‧ 國. 學. were reflected in the study and it may result from the competitive atmosphere of the. ‧. peer evaluation as the authors mentioned in the study (p.47).. sit. y. Nat. Previous research overwhelmingly shows that Taiwanese EFL leaners prefer. io. er. native accent to others. After understanding Taiwanese learners’ preference toward their teachers’ accent and among the varieties of English accents, their leaning goals. al. n. v i n C h of native accent are still unclear. Leaners’ preference e n g c h i U does not mean they will set. native-like accent to be their leaning goal. To illuminate the pronunciation teaching in Taiwan, students’ learning goals are in need to be investigated. Therefore, the study explored Taiwanese students’ perspectives and also examined the factors and their motivation contributing to their choices. Therefore, this study sought to answer the questions including: 1. Do Taiwanese students prefer the native accents or their own variant as their learning goals? Why do they have this kind of preference (motivation)?. . 17 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(30) . 2. What factors might contribute to students' preference? What is the relationship between the participants' choices and these factors (i.e., gender, self-perceived proficiency, familiarity, and exposure to English-speaking countries)?. The structure of the two research questions is shown in Figure 1. To explore the central question with regard to the learners’ learning goal in pronunciation, the four factors in the participants’ background information would be investigated to determine which factor plays an important role in their choice of pronunciation goals. Besides,. 治政大 also be examined to the participants’ motivation and attitudes towards accents would 立 confirm whether they influence how the participants set their learning goals.. ‧ 國. 學. Figure 1. The structure of the two research questions. ‧. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. . Ch. engchi. i n U. v. 18 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(31) . CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY The methodology of the study included four parts: the participants of the current study, the instruments used, the research procedures, and the data analysis method.. Participants Participants were 172 high school students in northern Taiwan excluding the unfinished 25 questionnaires. This study adopted stratified sampling and the. 政治大. participants were categorized into three groups: general high school, elite high school,. 立. and comprehensive junior-senior high school. The definition of each high school. ‧ 國. 學. would be stated in the following paragraphs.. General high schools are common secondary high schools consist of three years. ‧. of schooling based on the definition of Minister of Education in Taiwan. Among. y. Nat. sit. general high schools, there are some schools that are generally more prestigious and. n. al. er. io. students there have better academic performance. These schools are so-called elite high schools.. Ch. engchi. i n U. v. According to Department of Education in Taipei City Government, there is no universal definition of elite high schools. In one of their reports, elite high schools were defined as schools whose minimum admission is equal to or above PR 95 in The Basic Competence Test for Junior High School Students in 2009 and the definition was adopted in the present study. The PR, Percentage Rank, of a score is the percentage of scores in its frequency distribution that are equal to or lower than it. For example, the students in the elite high school in this study would have test scores that are greater than 95 percent of the scores of students taking the test. Furthermore, comprehensive junior-senior high schools are composed of . 19 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(32) . three-year education in junior high schools and three-year in senior high schools according to Laws and Regulations Retrieving System of Ministry of Education in Taiwan. In each school, two classes of students (about 70) were chosen to participate in this study. The classes selected were based on the availability of the teachers in each high school. Each of the three teachers, who helped to carry out the study, chose two of their classes to participate in the study. Besides, varying factor like gender for students were taken into consideration to make the participants representative. Therefore, the classes were all co-educational and had both male and female students.. 治政大 Among the 172 participants, there are 97 females and 75 males. 立. High school students were selected as the participants for two reasons. First of all,. ‧ 國. 學. previous study focused on the attitudes of university students and high school students’. ‧. voices were little heard. According to Ministry of Education, high school students. sit. y. Nat. have four English credits in each semester, which means four English classes every. io. er. week. As the intensive English leaners in Taiwan, high school students’ attitudes should be considered. Therefore, this study may shed lights on secondary school. n. al. instruction.. Ch. engchi. i n U. v. Instrument The instrument used in the present study: questionnaire (about background information of the participants, and their preference in different accents and their leaning motivation), the verbal-guise technique (VGT). Each will be explained in details.. . 20 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(33) . A questionnaire about the background information of students (Appendix A) The background information required in this study consists of four parts: gender, self-perceived proficiency, familiarity and the exposure to English speaking countries since previous studies proved that gender difference (Bernaisch & Koch, 2015; Hundt, Zipp & Huber, 2015; McKenzie, 2008), self-perceived proficiency (McKenzie, 2008), familiarity (Dalton-Puffer et al., 1997) and exposure (McKenzie, 2008) play a crucial role in the participants’ attitudes. According to McKenzie (2008), exposure means experience of traveling to English-speaking countries and in the research of Dalton-Puffer et al.(1997), the definition of familiarity is composed of the respondents’. 治政大 stays in English speaking familiarity with certain accents at school and /or during 立. countries. These two facets were separated to discuss in this study. Therefore, in this. ‧ 國. 學. study, the participants’ familiarity would be surveyed in how much time they immerse. ‧. themselves in English during their daily life while exposure would be discussed in. er. io. sit. y. Nat. how much time they have ever spent in English-speaking countries.. A questionnaire about accents and learning motivations (Appendix B). al. n. v i n C h from Timmis U The questionnaire was adapted e n g c h i (2002) and translated into Chinese.. The participants would state their learning goal in pronunciation and they would be asked to make a choice first from the two statements.. Student A: ‘I can pronounce English just like a native speaker now. Sometimes, people think I am a native speaker.’ Student B: ‘I can pronounce English clearly now. Native speakers and non-native speakers understand me wherever I go, but I still have the accent of my country’ (Timmis, 2002). . 21 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(34) . After making a choice, they had to provide their reasons and the following eight reasons were developed in this study. The participants have to rate by the eight provided reasons for their choices with a 4-point Likert-scale (1 = very disagree; 2 = disagree; 3 = agree; and 4 = very agree). The reasons were designed to investigate the participants’ motivation of learning English. The motivation of participants was proved to influence the attitude in the studies of Lennartsson(2008) and Jain & Sidhu (2013); thus, it would be considered in this study. The eight reasons to learn English (motivation) were generally based on the. 政治大. concept of instrumental and integrative motivations (Gardener and Lambert, 1959).. 立. According to Norris-Holt (2001), learners with the instrumental motivation consider. ‧ 國. 學. their purposes of language learning more utilitarian way. On the other hand, learners with integrative motivation wish to integrate themselves into the culture of the target. ‧. language group. According to Gardener and Lambert (1959), students with integrative. Nat. sit. y. motivations would be expected to work harder to polish their communication skills in. n. al. er. io. the second language. Therefore, to investigate whether the participants in this survey. i n U. v. had this kind of tendency, the eight motivations were categorized based on the types of motivation.. Ch. engchi. Three statements in the questionnaire (1. “I want to take English proficiency tests to get certificates.” 2. “I may go abroad to study in the future.” 7. “It will make me competitive in job market.”) are categorized to instrumental motivation while the other three (4. “I want to live abroad in the future.” 6. “I want to make friends with people from different countries.” 8. “I want to go abroad to work and travel in the future.”) are integrative motivation, which can be referred from Crookes & Schmidt’s (1991) definition “Integrative motivation is identified with positive attitudes toward. . 22 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(35) . the target language group and the potential for integrating into that group, or at least an interest in meeting and interacting with members of the target language group.” In addition, the rest of the two statements are common belief of the participants (3. “Other people may think I am good at English.” 5. “Native accent is the perfect accent”) from previous studies (Lee & Wang 2015; Timmis, 2002; Tokumoto & Shibata, 2011). To generate more of the participants’ viewpoints, there is also an open-ended question that they can provide their own reasons in the following blank to elicit more viewpoints from the participants.. 政治大. The verbal-guise technique (VGT) (Appendix C). 立. This section examined the participants’ language attitudes towards native accent. ‧ 國. 學. and Taiwanese accent. The participants would listen to two recordings from the. ‧. International Dialects of English Archive and then rate them respectively. The first recording is from a 32-year-old female from New York, which represents the native. y. Nat. er. io. sit. accent. The reason to choose the New York accent is that this dialect is the most recognizable accent in the United States due to its popularity in the media (Labov,. al. n. v i n 2006). The second recordingC was read by a 30-year-old Taiwanese female, who was a hengchi U graduate student in the United Sates. Since the subject’s first language is Mandarin Chinese and born in Taiwan, she was selected to stand for Taiwanese accent. To minimalize other factors that might affect the results of the study, both clips share the same script and the two females who participated in recording were in similar ages. After listening to the recordings of the two speakers, the participants evaluated them based on 16 personality traits adopted in He and Zhang’s (2010) study. The rating was based on the 4-point Likert scale: 1 = the voice does not match with the given trait at all; 2 = the voice does not match with the given voice so well; 3 = the. . 23 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(36) . voice matches with the given trait well; and 4 = the voice matches with the given trait very well. Instead of using the 5-Likert scale used by He and Zhang (2010), the choice of the even number scale would “force respondents to evaluate each accent either positively or negatively and prevent form adopting a neutral position” (Jenkins, 2007 p.152). The verbal guise technique used in this study is widely applied in attitude studies to elicit the participants’ implicit attitudes towards different accents (Bernaisch and Koch, 2015; Cheng, 2009; Dalton-Puffer, Kaltenboeck and Simit, 1997; Lee & Wang, 2015; McKenzie, 2008). The reason to choose the verbal-guise technique instead of. 治政大matched-guise the matched-guise technique (Lambert et al., 1960) is that the 立. technique requires only one speaker with different accents to speak and then the. ‧ 國. 學. participants will be told that there are more than one speaker before they rate the. ‧. different accents. It was criticized most on the artificiality of the speakers because it is. sit. y. Nat. “practically impossible to find speakers who are equally convincing in several. io. er. disguises”(Dalton-Puffer et al., 1997 p.177). On the other hand, the verbal-guise technique, which was adopted in this study, involves participants listening to. al. n. v i n C hspeakers can speakUwithout the need to recording from different speakers. The engchi disguise, which is considered more natural than the matched-guise technique.. With these two instruments employed, the interpretations would be stronger to investigate the preference in pronunciation of Taiwanese learners and to discuss their motivation and factors contributing to their choices. After that, pedagogical implications would be provided to shed lights on pronunciation teaching in Taiwan.. . 24 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(37) . Procedure The data collection was undertaken in three high schools of Taiwan in September 2018, when the semester just began and the subjects had more free time to help complete the study. The participants included six classes of the students (172 students). Since they came from three high schools, I assigned a teacher in each school and made sure he/she understood how to conduct the survey. Then I handed my questionnaire and recordings to them. These three teachers in each high school were responsible for carrying out the survey, collecting the questionnaires and sending them back to me for further analysis. When conducting the survey, the people in charge had to answer the. 治政大 sure they finished the questions about the study from the participants to make 立 questionnaires without misunderstanding.. ‧ 國. 學. Besides, to ensure consistency of the measurement, the procedures involved in this. ‧. survey were the same. They students were all required to finish in the same order: the. sit. y. Nat. questionnaire about the background information, preference, and learning motivation,. io. er. and the VGT test during similar time span. First of all, this survey required the background information of the participants. Then, it investigated their output goals in. al. n. v i n C h whether they want pronunciation by explicitly asking e n g c h i U to sound like native speakers or to communicate fluently but with the Taiwanese accent. After that, the verbal-guise. technique (VGT) was applied to elicit their attitudes towards accents implicitly. They spent about 30 minutes on the survey.. Data analysis The study aims to explore Taiwanese learners’ attitudes towards accents by examining their learning goal and preference. To answer the following two research questions, this study used statistics to analyze the questionnaires.. . 25 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(38) . 1. Do Taiwanese students prefer the native accents or their own variant as their learning goals? Why do they have this kind of preference (motivation)? 2. What factors might contribute to students' preference? What is the relationship between the participants' choices and these factors (i.e., gender, self-perceived proficiency, familiarity, exposure to English-speaking countries)? To answer question one, the issue was probed both explicitly and implicitly in the two parts of the questionnaire as indicated in Figure 2. First, this study analyzed the main question lying in the second part of the questionnaire (Appendix B), which. 治政大participants chose either directly asked the participants about their learning goal. The 立 English with native accent or with fluent Taiwanese accent and percentages were. ‧ 國. 學. applied to analyze this data. Moreover, to implicitly explore the participants’. ‧. preference, this study also analyzed the results of VGT (Appendix C), which aimed to. sit. y. Nat. elicit the participants’ spontaneous reactions toward accents and compared it with. io. er. their learning goal to determine their accent preference. After the participants listened to the two recordings, they were required to rate among the 16 traits-14 positive. al. n. v i n adjectives and 2 negative ones. TheC higher means the more positive/negative h erating ngchi U attitude towards certain accent. The rates of the two recordings were analyzed to acquire their means and difference and also underwent t-test to determine the significance.. . 26 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(39) . Figure 2. Taiwanese Students’ Preference towards Accents. Besides, the participants’ motivations behind their learning goal (Appendix B) and the factors (Appendix A) behind their choices were also investigated in this study, which is presented in Figure 3. Percentage, which is a ratio expressed as a fraction of 100, was applied to analyze the participants’ motivation as well as the factors. Besides,. 治政 cross analysis was used to determine the relationship 大between them to figure out what 立 factors and motivations significantly contribute to their choices. ‧ 國. 學 ‧. Figure 3. Factors and Motivations behind the Participants’ Choices. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. . Ch. engchi. i n U. v. 27 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(40) . In order to elaborate the effect of motivations on the participants’ choices, they were asked to provide detailed reasons to learn a particular accent in the open-ended part. They could write in Chinese to help them articulate their opinions and their response would be collected and categorized based on the most frequent themes for further analysis.. 立. 政治大. ‧. ‧ 國. 學. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. . Ch. engchi. i n U. v. 28 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(41) . CHAPTER 4 RESULTS This chapter reports the results on the questionnaire survey including the four factors (gender, self-perceived proficiency, familiarity and exposure) in the background information, their attitudes toward accents, and the eight motivations, which can be further categorized into integrative, instrumental and others. Next, the results of verbal-guised technique are demonstrated and compared with the results of questionnaire to check the consistency.. 政治大. 立. Questionnaire Survey. ‧ 國. 學. Research Question 1: Attitudes toward Accents. The results show that 58 percent of the students would prefer themselves to be like. ‧. Student A (I can pronounce English just like a native speaker now. Sometimes, people. y. Nat. sit. think I am a native speaker), which suggests that more than half of the students set. n. al. er. io. their pronunciation goals to be native-like. Some of the participants wrote:. Ch. engchi. i n U. v. When you learn a language, you should learn the correct pronunciation and try to become a native speaker.. These students acknowledged the historical authority of native models and argued for their inherit superiority over other varieties of English.. If you want to learn a language, you should learn from its original accent, grammar, and custom.. . 29 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(42) . But at the same time they admitted the difficulty of achieving the goal:. It's better to pronounce English in “English” pronunciation but it's not easy.. On the other hand, there were 42 percent of them chose to become Student B (I can pronounce English clearly now. Native speakers and non-native speakers understand me wherever I go, but I still have the accent of my country), which means they don't mind speaking English with the accent of their own mother tongue. They elaborated their reasons in the open-ended question:. 立. 政治大. Language is for communication.. ‧ 國. 學 ‧. It’s good enough if people can understand.. sit. y. Nat. io. native accent, it’s still not a successful communication.. n. al. Ch. engchi. er. The purpose of communication is to understand. If people can’t understand your. i n U. v. It’s convenient when you travel. It’s enough to understand a language.. Some of their reasons are related to the communication function of a language and indicated that the purpose of communication is to acquire the information.. When confronting many different accents, I can still get information without difficulties.. . 30 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(43) . I can generally understand the meaning that foreigners want to convey.. These participants recognized the purpose of communication is information exchange and the communication can be successful as long as they could be understood accurately. In their points of view, accents have little to do with understanding.. Research Question 1: Verbal Guised Technique. 政治大 with the findings of the questionnaire survey in this study reported before. From table 立 In general, the results of the VGT displayed in Table 1 are found to be consistent. ‧ 國. 學. 1, it can be seen that multivariate analysis of variance indicated that significant differences between Taiwanese accent and native accent. To be more precise, native. ‧. accent was rated significantly higher than Taiwanese accent on nearly all the positive. sit. y. Nat. traits except three items- sincere (p=0.713), approachable (p=0.550) and patient. io. er. (p=0.470). Although the means of native accents for these three were still higher than. al. Taiwanese accents, there was no significant difference (p<0.05) in statistics level.. n. v i n C h positive behaviors These three personalities all describe e n g c h i U of a person; that is, people with these personality traits are easy to talk to and become friends. The results show that for the participants, accents did not affect their opinions towards people in terms of getting along with them. Despite the fact that the participants obtained more positive attitudes toward native accents, the ratings of the native accent on the two negative traits were slightly higher than the Taiwanese accent though these two ratings of the item arrogant (p=0.253) and aggressive (p=0.080) did not reveal significant difference (p<0.05). It is still worthy to note that when the participants were in favor of the native accent, the native accent . 31 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(44) . was still reported to be more arrogant and aggressive. This may arise from the classroom culture in Taiwan, which is still more conservative than western countries. Students are supposed to play passive roles in classroom and they have few opportunities to demonstrates their abilities. If they have some talents, presenting them in a humble way would be encouraged. When it comes to language learning, almost every student speaks with accents in Taiwan. If someone is different from others and speaks with perfect native accents, they may be seen as too arrogant or aggressive in others’ opinions.. 立. 政治大. ‧. ‧ 國. 學. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. . Ch. engchi. i n U. v. 32 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(45) . Table 1. Means and Differences of Taiwanese Accent and Native Accent on the 16 Traits Means Traits. Native. Accent. Accent. Difference. Sig.. 1.. Friendly. 2.38. 2.69. -0.31. 0.000**. 2.. Intelligent. 2.35. 2.90. -0.55. 0.000**. 3.. Educated. 2.57. 3.21. -0.64. 0.000**. 4.. Competent. -0.60. 0.000**. 5.. Industrious. -0.16. 0.040*. 6.. Sincere. -0.04. 0.713. -0.06. 0.550. -0.19. 0.017*. -0.46. 0.000**. 2.37. 8.. Considerate. 2.16. 2.35. 9.. Trustworthy. 2.21. 2.67. Wealthy. 2.13. 2.35. 1.97. 2.41. 10.. io. al. y. 2.31. ‧. Approachable. Nat. 7.. sit. 2.60. 學. 2.56. er. 立. 2.42 3.02 政治大 2.40 2.56. ‧ 國. Positive. Taiwanese. -0.22. 0.005**. -0.44. 0.000**. -0.52. 0.000**. Trendy. 12.. Powerful. 13.. Confident. 2.26. 3.09. -0.83. 0.000**. 14.. Patient. 2.17. 2.30. -0.13. 0.470. Arrogant. 1.84. 2.01. -0.17. 0.253. Aggressive. 2.45. 2.53. -0.08. 0.080. Negative 15. 16.. n. 11.. Ch. U e1.95 n g c h i2.47. v ni. Note **p < 0.01, *p<0.05. . 33 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(46) . Research Question 2: Motivations To probe the participants’ English learning motivations behind their choices, eight motivations were provided for them to rate from a 4-point Likert scale: strongly agree, agree, disagree, and strongly disagree. Based on the participants’ ratings, their learning motivations can be understood. The results of the eight motivations are as follows:. Table 2. Participants’ willingness to get English certificate. Agree Disagree 政治大. Strongly Agree. 立 41/99 (41.4％). Student A. 54/99 (54.5％). Student B. 18/73 (24.7％). Total. Strongly Disagree. 44/73 (60.3％). 8/73 (11％). 3/73 (4.1％). 72/172. 85/172. 12/172. 3/172. (41.9％). (49.4％). (7％). (1.7％). Nat. y. ‧. ‧ 國. 0/99 (0％). 學. 4/99 (4％). er. io. sit. Learners with the first motivation learn English based on practical reasons such as taking English tests to get certificates. From Table 2, 91.3 percent of the. al. n. v i n C h certificates wasUnecessary in the English participants agreed that possessing English engchi learning. Most of the participants in this survey acknowledged the importance of. getting English certificates. But the participants who prefer to pronounce native-like, student A, presented stronger motivation (95.9 percent) than the rest of the other participants, student B, (85 percent).. . 34 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.

(47) . Table 3. Participants’ motivation to go abroad to study in the future. Strongly. Agree. Disagree. Agree. Strongly Disagree. Student A. 24/99 (24.2％). 53/99 (53.5％). 21/99 (21.2％). 1/99 (1％). Student B. 6/73 (8.2％). 27/73 (37％). 33/73 (45.2％). 7/73 (9.6％). Total. 30/172. 80/172. 54/172. 8/172. (17.4％). (46.5％). (31.4％). (4.7％). Participants identifying with the second motivation presented an instrumental motivation to learn English. They consider there are possibilities for them to study. 治政大 of the students expressed a abroad in the future. The results show that 63.9 percent 立 wish to study abroad in the future. Among them, student A accounted for 77.7 percent ‧ 國. 學. while student B 45.2 percent, which means most students who strived for native. ‧. pronunciation consider it is necessary to study and communicate in the foreign. y. Nat. countries. For them, native accents are necessary for them to accommodate their lives. er. io. sit. in the foreign countries. In their opinions, similar accents may help them to get close to the native speakers. On the other hand, more than half of the students, who valued. al. n. v i n C hmore than nativeness, the importance of intelligibility e n g c h i U didn't think they would go abroad to study. Thus, there is less need for them to acquire native accents.. Table 4. Participants believe that other people would value their English abilities. Strongly. Agree. Disagree. Agree. Strongly Disagree. Student A. 23/99 (23.2％). 39/99 (39.4％). 28/99 (28.3％). 9/99 (9.1％). Student B. 2/73 (2.7％). 21/73 (28.8％). 35/73 (47.9％). 15/73 (20.5％). Total. 25/172. 60/172. 63/172. 24/172. (14.5％). (34.9％). (36.6％). (14％). . 35 . DOI:10.6814/THE.NCCU.ENG.001.2019.A09.