Abstract:
This research is a study of the acoustic characteristics, i.e., Formant 1, Formant 2, and the duration of long monophthongs in Bangkok Thai spoken by Isan speakers with different language experience compared to Bangkok speakers. The hypotheses are (1) acoustic characteristics of the 9 long monophthongs in Bangkok Thai spoken by Isan speakers differ from Bangkok speakers, the have higher Formant 1 and Formant 2 and shorter duration, (2) language experience of the Isan speakers influences the acoustic characteristics of vowels, when compared to Bangkok speakers acoustic characteristics, speakers with low language experience have greater differences than speakers with high language experience. It is found that the average of Formant 1 and the average of Formant 2 of the 9 long monophthongs are different among the 3 groups of informants. For the average F1, Isan speakers with high language experience has the highest F1 value compared to the Bangkok speakers and Isan speakers with low language experience. The variation in terms of F1 are statistically significant (p≤0.05) only with 3 vowels, i.e.; w:a: and o: However, the value of the standard deviation of the F1 is highest in Isan speakers with low language experience compared to Isan speakers with high language experience and Bangkok speakers. In terms of average duration of the vowels, Bangkok speakers have highest value compared to Isan speakers, and Isan speakers with low language experience have lowest duration value. The variations in terms of duration among the 3 groups of speakers are statistically significant (p≤0.05) except 2 vowels, I : and O :