Graduation Year

2026

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree

Ph.D.

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)

Degree Granting Department

World Languages

Major Professor

Katherine Yaw, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Camilla Vasquez, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Elizabeth Hanks, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Okim Kang, Ph.D.

Keywords

Speech Perception, CDST, Communicative Strategies, International Teaching Assistants

Abstract

In U.S. academic settings, everyday oral multilingual interactions can pose communicative challenges (Gass & Varonis, 1984), which can be understood and addressed by looking into communicative dynamics. Exploring the construct of comprehensibility, the perceived ease or difficulty in understanding self and others’ speech (Munro & Derwing, 1995a), through a dynamic lens (Nagle et al., 2019; Trofimovich et al., 2022) helps gaining insights into interlocutors’ subjective experiences to better understand the more social nature of successful real-time communication. This is fundamental in linguistically diverse classroom settings where L2 English speakers can be employed as International Teaching Assistants (ITAs) to teach undergraduate students, for example, and comprehensible speech is essential for effective teaching and students’ success. Within the Complex Dynamic System Theory (Larsen-Freeman, 1997), this quantitative study investigates the dynamic nature of comprehensibility during 32 assessed oral language performances of ITA candidates at a U.S. university. Through survey ratings and audio-recorded sessions, I analyzed the verbal exchanges between ITAs (n = 32), a pool of raters (n = 3) and undergraduate students (n = 7). Specifically, I explored the changes of ITAs’ perceived comprehensibility over time (RQ1), the influence of ITAs’ perceived anxiety, engagement, and willingness to communicate (RQ2), and the communicative strategies (CSs) employed by interlocutors in relation to the comprehensibility changes (RQ3). Findings from the linear mixed effect models showed high levels of individual variability in perception ratings, with time being statistically significant for comprehensibility changes. Anxiety, engagement, and WTC resulted to play a statistically significant role only for raters’ ratings of ITAs’ comprehensibility, while only engagement was statistically significant in undergraduates’ ratings. The frequency analysis revealed important differences in the type and frequency of CSs used for each group of participants, with a predominance of indirect strategies used, followed by direct and interactional strategies. No remarkable patterns were found in relation to comprehensibility changes. Overall, this study contributes to the L2 speech perception field by advancing a broader understanding of comprehensibility in interaction (Crowther & Isbell, 2023) and offers practical implications for ITA practitioners by encouraging a greater awareness of both comprehensibility and communicative strategies in training and professional development.

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