Englisches Seminar

Research

Our research investigates how human listeners comprehend and learn language, with a particular focus on spoken language. To achieve this, we integrate insights from psycholinguistics, cognitive psychology, speech science, and neuroscience. We also assess the relevance of these insights for second language teaching.

A key question in spoken language comprehension is how listeners manage the vast amount of variation in the speech signal. These variations can stem from many sources, including contextual factors such as phonological variation, as well as speaker-related factors like gender, age, or foreign accent. Our research explores how the speech system handles this variation, and when it either aids or hinders comprehension. We also examine how expectations and emotions influence spoken language comprehension.

In our language learning research, we typically focus on adult second language (L2) learners. While recognizing words and understanding sentences in one’s native language (L1) is usually effortless, these tasks become much more demanding when listening to a second language. Key issues in our L2 research include the involvement of both L1 and L2 lexicons, as well as the influence of a learner's L1 on L2 acquisition and processing. 

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