Relationships between Thai EFL Learners’ Competence and Performance in Locating Stress on English Polysyllabic Loanwords

Abstract

This paper reports the investigation on the students’ competence in identifying stress patterns of English polysyllabic loanwords, measured in the form of stress marking on a written test, in relation to their actual performance in two oral-reading tasks: (1) reading the target loanwords in English sentences, and (2) reading those words in isolation. The 30 target loanwords were classified into 3 categories: two-syllable, three-syllable, and four-syllable loanwords. Participants were 30 Thai students in the English-Major program of a university in Thailand. The results of the three tasks reveal a mid-level relationship between the students’ competence of stress and the performance in the oral-reading of loanwords in isolation. The correlation is significant at the 0.01 level. The finding indicates that in a more formal style of oral-reading, the effect of L1 transfer plays a less crucial role on the students’ speech, resulting in a closer relationship between competence and performance. When investigating the use of stress on loanwords according to the number of syllables, a significant correlation existed between the students’ competence and their performance in reading three-syllable loanwords in isolation. This finding suggests that the students possibly did not pay sufficient attention to stress patterns of two-syllable loanwords, causing them to perform inconsistently in different types of tasks. As for four-syllable loanwords, the students tended to locate stress randomly when performing each task due to insufficient knowledge of stress patterns in English polysyllabic words. The findings imply that in order to increase the levels of competence and performance in using stress, both teachers and students should pay more attention to stress patterns in English words with a high number of syllables. Moreover, students should always be careful with correct stress placement if an acceptable mastery of spoken English is a learning goal.