Tina Whyte-Ball

Research Student

Research Program: Speech and Language

Thesis Title

Early word recognition and perceptual adaptation across regional English accents by Arabic-L1 children in Australia

Research Project

I am interested in phonological constancy and distinctiveness among young L2 learning children, specifically children with immigrant parents of Arabic background. My thesis examines whether these immigrant children can recognize words from the L2 in both the Australian and Arabic accent, as well as words in a non-Australian English accent (e.g Jamaican mesolect) after only being exposed to Australian English as a L2. Additionally, it will be important to assess the impact that the difference in accent will have on the children's lexical knowledge and their ability to recognize words.  This study's broad goal is to increase understanding of the phonological development of children in general and bilingual children in particular.

Qualifications

• BA. Linguistics (Hons 1^st class), University of the West Indies, Jamaica
• MPhil. Linguistics,  University of the West Indies, Jamaica

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