Interference Features Assessment in Junior Secondary School Students E?ki?ti?-speaking Standard Spoken Yorùbá in Èkìtì State, Nigeria

This study investigated the interference features in the standard spoken Yorùbá of Èkìtì-speaking junior secondary school (jss) students in Èkìtì, Èkìtì State. Due to the multilingual nature of the Nigerian society, language usage problems that tend to occur include interference from the mother tongue and inadequate mastery of the rules of the standard Yorùbá language. Hence, the identification of features that interfere in the standard spoken Yorùbá of Èkìtì-speaking Junior Secondary School Students necessitated this study. This study adopted a descriptive research design. Multi-stage sampling technique was used to select 100 jss E?ki?ti?-speaking students from five schools in I?ko??le? Local Government Area in Èkìtì State. The instrument adopted for this study was a researcher-designed Test of Interference Features (TIF) which was administered to the participants to obtain data. The data were analysed using percentage and the t-test statistic. Findings of the study revealed that there were interference features in the standard spoken Yorùbá of Èkìtì-speaking jss students. In other words, the Èkìtì dialect interferes with the standard spoken Yorùbá of the students. It was also revealed that there was no significant difference in the Yorùbá consonant sounds and Yorùbá vowel sounds which reflect interference features in the spoken standard Yorùbá of Èkìtì-speaking male and female jss students. Among others, it was recommended that teachers of Yorùbá language should pay more attention to the various Yorùbá consonant sounds which tend to reflect interference features in the spoken Yorùbá of male and female Èkìtì-speaking jss students.