Phonological awareness and alphabetic knowledge of native speakers of non-alphabetic languages

Abstract

The present study examined the effects of different alphabetic scripts (pinyin and International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA)) on phonological awareness of non-alphabetic languages (Cantonese and Mandarin). Sixty undergraduates and graduated adults were recruited to perform a set of phonological awareness tasks to reveal their phonological awareness at different levels: syllable awareness, rhyme awareness, phoneme awareness, tone awareness and phonological knowledge. The results indicated that individuals with explicit instructions on alphabetic scripts (both pinyin and IPA) performed more superiorly than those without such instructions in general, except the tasks in syllable awareness, tone awareness and phonological knowledge. Meanwhile, the results also indicated that individuals with explicit IPA instructions performed more superiorly than those with pinyin instructions in rhyme production. This suggested that different types of alphabetic scripts might promote phonological awareness at different levels. The difference can be explained by the uniqueness of grapheme-phoneme-correspondence represented by the alphabetic units in each alphabetic script.