L2 Accentedness and Language Self-Esteem in Foreign Language Learning

Magdalena Szyszka

doi:10.18778/1731-7533.20.1.02

Authors

Magdalena Szyszka University of Opole, Poland

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18778/1731-7533.20.1.02

Keywords:

self-esteem, language self-esteem, accentedness, foreign language learning

Abstract

Accentedness is associated with listeners’ evaluative judgements, which might affect an L2 speaker’s construction of an image about linguistic self-worth and competence, described as language (L2) self-esteem. This line of inquiry is pursued in the study presented in this paper, which investigates the relationship between L2 self-esteem and the extent to which a learner’s L2 pronunciation differs from a listener’s representation of it – accentedness. The results show that the level of L2 self-esteem correlates with accentedness, and the direction of this correlation is negative (r = -.51). The findings also reveal that the L2 self-esteem levels of the participants whose accentedness is closer to native-like are significantly higher than those of the individuals with strongly accented speech.

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