Challenges of English speakingproficiency for Japanese L1 speakers. : Case for Japanese University Students.

This study examines the phonological challenges encountered by Japanese L1 speakersaged 19-25, particularly in the acquisition and production of English consonants, with afocus on systematic differences between the segments and segment strings of Japaneseand English. What is apparent with Japanese is that many English consonant sounds aremissing from the language completely – most saliently /l/, /r/, /v/, /θ/, and /ð/ – whichresults in high levels of segmental substitutions: /l/ and /r/ become the same sound, [ɾ],and interdental fricatives become alveolar or stop consonants (e.g., /θ/ → [s], /ð/ → [d]).Furthermore, the Japanese syllable structure itself does not allow complex consonantclusters nor syllable-final obstruents, thus requiring vowel epenthesis and consonantdrops. It is the phonological mismatches which are responsible for heavily accentedspeech and a low level of intelligibility.