The Effects of Syllable Position on the Production of English Consonants by Korean Learners of English

This study aims to investigate the effect of syllable position on the articulation of English obstruents produced by Korean learners of English and English native speakers. It has been found that segmental properties are affected by prosodic position. However, it is uncertain how the acoustic properties depending on different syllable positions are different between native speakers and L2 learners. The results of present study indicate that for English speakers and Korean learners of English, F2 onset/offset and RMS burst energy for stops are enhanced in syllable initial position. In the results of duration, Korean learners produce longer fricatives in syllable final position than in initial position, while English speakers do not show consistent pattern between the two different syllable positions. The present study provides evidence that Korean learners of English show syllable dependant properties in the articulation of English consonants. However, the enhancing strategies are found to be different across language groups and segment categories