Xiao Huimin, Xu Caihua, Rusamy Hetty
Chinese Language and Culture College, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China.
Chinese Department, Xin Zhong School, Surabaya, Indonesia.
Front Psychol. 2020 Dec 9;11:596680. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.596680. eCollection 2020.
Pinyin is a phonological encoding system used to spell modern Chinese Mandarin due to the phonological opacity of Chinese characters. The present study examined the role of Pinyin spelling in the reading abilities of adolescents learning Chinese as a foreign language (CFL). A total of 158 Indonesian senior primary students were tested on Pinyin spelling, character production, listening comprehension, depth of vocabulary knowledge, and reading comprehension. Pinyin spelling skills were assessed by two measures, Pinyin Dictation (sentence dictation in Pinyin) and Pinyin Tagging (Pinyin writing for characters). Path analysis revealed that even after controlling for the effect of character production, Pinyin dictation performance influenced reading comprehension through the mediating effect of listening comprehension and the depth of vocabulary knowledge, and Pinyin tagging performance also influenced reading comprehension through the mediating effect of the depth of vocabulary knowledge. The results highlight the importance of Pinyin skills for Chinese reading abilities of CFL learners. As a reliable and explicit indicator of specifying Chinese phonological representations and processing, Pinyin spelling has a long-term and multifaceted influence on higher-level CFL abilities.
拼音是一种语音编码系统，由于汉字的语音不透明性，它被用于拼写现代汉语普通话。本研究考察了拼音拼写在将汉语作为外语学习的青少年（CFL）阅读能力中的作用。总共158名印度尼西亚高年级小学生接受了拼音拼写、汉字书写、听力理解、词汇知识深度和阅读理解方面的测试。拼音拼写技能通过两种方式进行评估，即拼音听写（用拼音进行句子听写）和拼音标注（为汉字书写拼音）。路径分析表明，即使在控制了汉字书写的影响之后，拼音听写成绩仍通过听力理解和词汇知识深度的中介作用影响阅读理解，拼音标注成绩也通过词汇知识深度的中介作用影响阅读理解。研究结果凸显了拼音技能对CFL学习者汉语阅读能力的重要性。作为一种可靠且明确的指定汉语语音表征和处理的指标，拼音拼写对更高水平的CFL能力具有长期且多方面的影响。
