Music and the acquisition of L2 prosody: perceptual and productive perspectives
(2026) American Association of Applied Linguistics - AAAL — Location: Chicago (21.March.2026)
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- Acquiring pronunciation in a foreign language - particularly at the prosodic level- remains a challenging, under-researched, and often neglected area in language learning and teaching [1]. Music may offer a promising avenue to support this acquisition: beyond its motivational and affective advantages, music shares key acoustic features with language, which seem to facilitate oral acquisition [2]. Moreover, learners with musical training or aptitude tend to show greater ease in acquiring oral aspects of foreign languages [3]. However, few studies have specifically explored the link between music and the acquisition of prosody, especially in non-tonal languages and across both perceptual and productive dimensions. This study focuses on the perception and production of Dutch word stress by French learners - two languages with markedly different prosodic systems resulting in oral difficulties for French speaking learners of Dutch. It investigates whether musical characteristics, either present in the task (e.g., rhythm or melody) or in the learner’s profile (e.g., musical training), can facilitate acquisition. Several experiments were conducted. At the perceptual level, participants performed an XAB discrimination task with 96 stimuli (spoken, rhythmically enhanced, or sung). We tested different groups selected according to musical and linguistic criteria and whose background was documented through several questionnaires: 25 musicians and 21 non-musicians; 80 university students; and 119 secondary school learners. Results consistently showed that learners with musical experience or aptitude performed better, and that rhythmic or melodic enhancements improved task performance. At the productive level, 20 musicians and 20 non-musicians completed a production task targeting both word-level and phrasal stress. Their production was evaluated by two experts of Dutch pronunciation. Unlike in perception, no significant differences were found between groups in production accuracy. The results will be discussed and critically evaluated, highlighting practical implications drawing on perspectives from language teachers. [1] Kennedy, S., & Trofimovich, P. (2017). Pronunciation Acquisition. In The Routledge Handbook of Instructed Second Language Acquisition. Routledge. [2] Patel, A. D. (2010). Music, language, and the brain. Oxford university press. [3] Schellenberg, E. G., & Lima, C. F. (2024). Music Training and Nonmusical Abilities. Annual Review of Psychology, 75(Volume 75, 2024), 87‑128. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-psych-032323-051354
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Degrave, P. (2026). Music and the acquisition of L2 prosody: perceptual and productive perspectives. American Association of Applied Linguistics - AAAL, Chicago. https://hdl.handle.net/2078.5/274346