Studies on L1 listening reported beneficial effects of filled pauses in speech. They provide word segmentation cues that enhance syntactic parsing (segmentation effect hypothesis, Corley & Hartsuiker, 2011) and allow time to process the preceding utterance (processing time hypothesis, e.g., Fraundorf & Watson, 2011). However, whether the benefits they bring to L1 listening apply to L2 listening has not been fully investigated. This study therefore examined the two hypotheses in L2 listening. Forty-eight participants worked on following-directions tasks using maps. I observed the effects of the filled pause uh occurring in three locations: (1) between clauses using Between-Clause Filled-Pause Tasks, (2) between phrases using Between-Phrase Filled-Pause Tasks, and (3) within phrases using Within- Phrase Filled-Pause Tasks. A comparison of reaction times between tasks with and without a filled pause showed that L2 listeners may benefit from the segmentation effect of filled pauses if filled pauses do not disrupt syntactic processing of the perceived utterance, but the processing time effect does not apply to L2 listeners. Theoretical, methodological, and pedagogical implications are provided.
Manami KOBAYASHI (Mon,) studied this question.