ABSTRACT
This chapter represents three different topics of study, namely: language attitudes, intelligibility, and phonetics. Studies that analyse factors affecting native speaker perception of nonnative Englishes often cite intelligibility and comprehensibility as the factors most often employed in investigating native listeners’ evaluations. The relationship between participants’ intelligibility scores, perceived comprehensibility ratings, and duration of exposure to spoken English were analysed. Stress perception does seem to be a source of unintelligibility given the large volume of research showing how “unintelligible” some “nonnative” Englishes are. English proficiency also seemed to be the most influential in dictation scores, with results showing significant correlation with Test of English as a Foreign Language scores. The chapter provides a few remarks specifically focusing on the way the questionnaires and surveys were designed and implemented. The major advantage of using questionnaires and surveys is the ability to engage a large number of participants and across different geographical locales.
