Training with rhythmic beat gestures benefits L2 pronunciation in discourse-demanding situations
Open accessAbstract
Recent research has shown that beat gestures (hand gestures that co-occur with speech in spontaneous discourse) are temporally integrated with prosodic prominence and that they help word memorization and discourse comprehension. However, little is known about the potential beneficial effects of beat gestures in second language (L2) pronunciation learning. This study investigates the impact of beat gesture observation on the acquisition of native-like speech patterns in English by examining the effect of a brief training with or without beat gestures on participants’ ratings of accentedness. In a within-participants, pre-/post-test design, participants (undergraduate students learning English as a foreign language) watched a training video in which an L2 instructor gave spontaneous responses to discourse prompts. The prompts belonged to one of two categories (easy and difficult), and were presented by the instructor either with or without accompanying beat gestures. Participants’ own answers to the prompts were recorded before and after training and evaluated by five native speaker judges. The results of the comparison between the participants’ pre-training and post-training speech samples demonstrated that beat gesture training significantly improved the participants’ accentedness ratings on the set of difficult (more discourse-demanding) items. The results of the study support the role of beat gestures as highlighters of rhythmic information and have implications for pronunc…
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There is much research providing empirical support for the role of gestures in L2 learning for aspects such as speech comprehension, word memorization and pronunciation.
“There is much research providing empirical support for the role of gestures in L2 learning for aspects such as speech comprehension [9,10], word memorization [11,12] and pronunciation [13–17].”
From Can grammatical morphemes be taught? Evidence of gestures influencing second language procedural learning in middle childhood (2023) · cites this paper as [13]
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Answers to 20 questions about interrater reliability and interrater agreement
LeBreton, J. M., & Senter, J. L. (2008) · Organizational Research Methods · doi:10.1177/1094428106296642 · Cited by 3,608 · cited 1× · see citing works
“It is likely that this was caused by the relatively small number of raters involved, considering that this measure of inter-rater reliability is attenuated when the number of judges is small (LeBreton & Senter, 2008).”
BackgroundThe effect of gestures on second language memorisation by young children
Tellier, M. (2008) · Gesture · doi:10.1075/gest.8.2.06tel · Cited by 257 · see citing works
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Janzen Ulbricht, N. (2023) · PLOS ONE · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0280543 · Cited by 3 · see citing works
- Authors
- Gluhareva, D., & Prieto, P.
- Affiliations
- Universitat Pompeu Fabra (ES)
- Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats (ES)
- Corresponding author
- Gluhareva, Daria
- ORCID
- Prieto, Pilar
- Venue
- Language Teaching Research
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2016-06-08
- Volume
- 21
- Issue
- 5
- Pages
- 609-631
- ISSN
- 1362-1688 (ISSN-L)
- 1477-0954
- OpenAlex
- W2410458240
- Cited by
- 96
- References
- 2
- Citations by year
- 2026: 11 · 2025: 10 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 9 · 2022: 9 · 2021: 11 · 2020: 12 · 2019: 4 · 2018: 22 · 2017: 1
- FWCI
- 12.81
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- hdl.handle.net
- Locations
- Language Teaching Research (publishedVersion)
- Repositori digital de la UPF (Universitat Pompeu Fabra) (acceptedVersion)
- RECERCAT (Consorci de Serveis Universitaris de Catalunya) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Funders
- Generalitat de Catalunya (2014SGR-925)
- Ministerio de Educación, Cultura y Deporte (MINECO-FFI2013-31995)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Phonetics and Phonology Research
- Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Language and Linguistics › EFL/ESL Teaching and Learning
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Second Language Acquisition and Learning
- Keywords
- beat gestures, second language pronunciation, English as a foreign language, accentedness, prosodic prominence, speech rhythm, pronunciation teaching
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