Reinvestment and spoken language proficiency : evidence from Cantonese learners of Mandarin and Mandarin learners of Cantonese

Abstract

The Speech Reinvestment Scale (SRS) (Wong, in preparation) was a newly developed questionnaire to investigate one’s predisposition to exert conscious control over speech movements. The present study was designed to determine (1) if any differences exist between SRS scores in first and second language production; (2) if any correlation exists between one’s oral proficiency and one’s SRS score in a second language. Two groups of participants (Group 1: 63 Cantonese-speaking learners of Mandarin; Group 2: 41 Mandarin-speaking learners of Cantonese) were recruited and each participant was asked to fill in a questionnaire on demographic information, complete two SRS forms, in regard to first and second language, respectively and to record a speech sample using their second language. The speech samples were rated by 3 listeners in each group to obtain an average proficiency score for each participant. The results revealed a significant difference between SRS score in first and second language. No significant correlation was found between L2 SRS and proficiency score. This may indicate that the relationship between reinvestment and speech proficiency is more complicated than we expected. Since research on the SRS is still very new and the relationship between reinvestment and speech proficiency is still unclear, further investigations are recommended.