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Article published In: Journal of Second Language Pronunciation
Vol. 11:1 (2025) ► pp.103–130

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Spanish rhotic acquisition in semester-long study-abroad and at-home contexts

ORCiD logo with link | Furman UniversityGreenvilleSC
 | Furman UniversityGreenvilleSC
Published online: 29 April 2025
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/jslp.24037.mic
Abstract
The present study compares the L2 acquisition of Spanish rhotics (intervocalic taps /ɾ/ and trills /r/) by 16 semester-long study-abroad (SA) participants and 7 at-home (AH) peers using an experimental production task. Data collected at three different time points (pre-/mid-/post-semester) suggest an advantage of study-abroad in the acquisition of trills containing multiple occlusions. Participants at all proficiency levels showed significant movement towards multiple-occlusion trills throughout the semester. Intensity of contact with Spanish interacted with proficiency, enhancing gains at certain levels. Results indicate that segment duration can also serve as a useful phonemic contrast. While both the SA and AH groups significantly increased trill segment duration over time, only the SA group sustained the increase from mid- to post-semester. These findings have theoretical and pedagogical implications for the acquisition of L2 phonetic categories and phonemic distinctions that differ from the L1.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Background
    • 2.1Spanish rhotics and L2 acquisition
    • 2.2Study abroad and L2 Spanish phonetic development
    • 2.3Research questions
    • 3.Methods
      • 3.1Participants
      • 3.2Elicitation procedures
      • 3.3Data coding and analysis
    • 4.Results
      • 4.1Taps
      • Duration: Tap-trill contrast
    • 4.2Trills
      • Number of trill occlusions
      • Trill duration
      • Extralinguistic factors
  • 5.Discussion
  • 6.Conclusions
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
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