I’m an assistant professor in the Department of Chinese and Bilingual Studies at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU). I study how people learn unfamiliar speech sounds in either a new language or foreign-accented speech. My research most often examines these issues in the context of Mandarin Chinese, a tonal language. I conduct my research using behavioral and neurophysiological (ERP) methods.
Prior to PolyU, my home was at Penn State in the Center for Language Science, where I worked with Janet van Hell, Carrie Jackson, and Matthew Carlson to expand research on foreign accent and tones in new directions. I also have an ongoing collaboration with Anne Olmstead and Navin Viswanathan from the department of Communication Sciences and Disorders, and Yuka Tatsumi examining Mandarin tone sandhi in interactive communicate contexts.
I earned my PhD in the Second Language Acquisition program at the University of Maryland, College Park. My advisor was Robert DeKeyser. I also worked closely with Ellen Lau in Linguistics.
Before joining Maryland’s SLA program, I taught Mandarin for six years in the U.S., including two summers at Middlebury College’s Chinese Language School. This experience motivates my research interests in second language acquisition.
Links to publications
Dickson, D. & Pelzl, E. (in press) Using time-based encephalography to investigate L2. In K. Morgan-Short and J. G. van Hell (Eds) The Routledge Handbook of Second Language Acquisition and Neurolinguistics. [publisher’s website]
Pelzl, E., Liu, J., Qi, C. (2022) Native language experience with tones influences both phonetic and lexical processes when acquiring a second tonal language. Journal of Phonetics. [author’s version]
Pelzl, E., Lau, E., Guo, T., DeKeyser, R., C. (2021) Advanced second language learners of Mandarin show persistent deficits for lexical tone encoding in picture-to-word form matching. Frontiers in Communication [open access article] [data and supplementary materials]
Pelzl, E. (2021) Foreign-accent in second language Mandarin Chinese. In C. Yang (Ed.) The acquisition of Chinese as a second language pronunciation: Segments and prosody (pp. 257-279). Springer. [author’s version]
Pelzl, E., Lau, E., Guo, T., DeKeyser, R., C. (2021) Even in the best-case scenario L2 learners have persistent difficulty perceiving and utilizing tones in Mandarin: Findings from behavioral and ERP experiments. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 43(2), 268-296. [read-only-link] [stimuli]
Pelzl, E., Lau, E. F., Jackson, S. R., Guo, T., Gor, K. (2021). Behavioral and neural responses to tone errors in foreign-accented Mandarin. Language Learning. [read-only-link] [data and supplementary materials]
Pelzl, E., Carlson, M. T., Guo, T., Jackson, C. N., van Hell, J. G. (2021) Tuning out tone errors? Native listeners do not down-weight tones when hearing unsystematic tone errors in foreign-accented Mandarin. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S1366728920000280 [author’s version]
Pelzl, E. (2019) What makes perception of Mandarin tones difficult for second language learners? A non-technical review of evidence from psycholinguistic research. Chinese as a Second Language (漢語教學研究—美國中文教師學會學報). 54(1), 51-78. doi: 10.1075/csl.18009.pel [author’s version]
Pelzl, E., Lau, E., Guo, T., DeKeyser, R. (2019) Advanced second language learners’ perception of lexical tone contrasts. Studies in Second Language Acquisition. 41(1), 59-86. doi:10.1017/S0272263117000444 [read-only link]
Key words: Mandarin, lexical tones, accent, speech comprehension, psycholinguistics, EEG, foreign language teaching
© 2023-2024 Eric Pelzl; Updated 2023-Aug-20