Abstract: Existing studies have revealed that a wide variety of learner factors influence the production of L2 speech sounds. These factors include age of L2 learning, length of residence in an L2-speaking country, gender, formal instruction, motivation, language learning aptitude, and amount of native language use. However, little attention has been paid to the cognitive dimensions of individual differences. Meanwhile, most of the studies were conducted in L2 learning contexts. Thus their results should be further examined in FL learning contexts considering the huge differences between these two types of contexts.
The current study explored the effects of learning styles on Chinese college students’ production of English /i/-/ɪ/ with the impacts of other relevant learner factors taken into consideration, i.e. age of starting English education, length of English education, use of English, value of improving English pronunciation, and concern for English pronunciation. Eighty three Chinese college students with different learning styles as measured using Kolb’s LSI-1985 and a control group of 16 native English speakers read a list of words (beat or bit) in the carrier phrase“I will say ”. The accuracy of their production was assessed through acoustic measurements regarding their vowel duration, f0, F1 and F2.
The results showed that the performance of Chinese college students was highly variable and their accuracy of production was significantly related to their learning styles. Specifically, assimilators and divergers performed more similarly to native English speakers than convergers and accommodators. It was also revealed that the more often the students spoke English, the more similar their production was to that of native English speakers, while other factors, i.e. age of starting English education, length of English education, value of improving English pronunciation, and concern for English pronunciation, bore no direct relation to their performance.

Key words: learning styles, learner factors, production