Sonorant Onset Pitch as a Perceptual Cue of Lexical Tones in Mandarin

Chen, Tsung-Ying; Tucker, Benjamin V.

doi:10.1159/000356194

Cited by 8 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 38 publications

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“…The results from Brenner's studies indicate that recognizing tones in casual speech is more difficult than in careful speech. He also shows that tone perception in casual speech is a complex interaction of acoustic cues and not just based on pitch, which is in line with previous careful speech research (e.g., Taft & Chen, 1999;Fu and Zeng, 2000;Liu and Samuel, 2004;Chen & Tucker, 2013). Brenner's results suggest that in everyday conversations, listeners may rely on different cues for language processing than would be expected based on laboratory studies alone.…”

Section: Differences In Tones and Intonationsupporting

confidence: 83%

Why we need to investigate casual speech to truly understand language production, processing and the mental lexicon

Tucker

Ernestus

2016

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The majority of studies addressing psycholinguistic questions focus on speech produced and processed in a careful, laboratory speech style. This ‘careful’ speech is very different from the speech that listeners encounter in casual conversations. This article argues that research on casual speech is necessary to show the validity of conclusions based on careful speech. Moreover, research on casual speech produces new insights and questions on the processes underlying communication and on the mental lexicon that cannot be revealed by research using careful speech. This article first places research on casual speech in its historic perspective. It then provides many examples of how casual speech differs from careful speech and shows that these differences may have important implications for psycholinguistic theories. Subsequently, the article discusses the challenges that research on casual speech faces, which stem from the high variability of this speech style, its necessary casual context, and that casual speech is connected speech. We also present opportunities for research on casual speech, mostly in the form of new experimental methods that facilitate research on connected speech. However, real progress can only be made if these new methods are combined with advanced (still to be developed) statistical techniques.

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Section: Differences In Tones and Intonationsupporting

confidence: 83%

Why we need to investigate casual speech to truly understand language production, processing and the mental lexicon

Tucker

Ernestus

2016

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“…P 2 through P 4 were always vowels. Since it has been shown that sonorant onset consonants can signal tonal information (Chen & Tucker, 2013; Howie, 1974), the nasals /m/ and /n/ and the glides and liquids /l/, /ʐ/, and /tɕ/ ([m], [n], [l], [r], and [j] in Pinyin) were allowed to carry tone, in addition to the subsequent vowels. This was done by setting T HS-1 to a tone unit if P 1 corresponded to a vowel or sonorant consonant; otherwise, T HS-1 was set to the “silent” tone unit (T silent ).…”

Section: How the Trace-t Model Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Encoding lexical tones in jTRACE: a simulation of monosyllabic spoken word recognition in Mandarin Chinese

Shuai

Malins

2016

Behav Res

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Despite its prevalence as one of the most highly influential models of spoken word recognition, the TRACE model has yet to be extended to consider tonal languages such as Mandarin Chinese. A key reason for this is that the model in its current state does not encode lexical tone. In this report, we present a modified version of the jTRACE model in which we borrowed on its existing architecture to code for Mandarin phonemes and tones. Units are coded in a way that is meant to capture the similarity in timing of access to vowel and tone information that has been observed in previous studies of Mandarin spoken word recognition. We validated the model by first simulating a recent experiment that had used the visual world paradigm to investigate how native Mandarin speakers process monosyllabic Mandarin words (Malins & Joanisse, 2010). We then subsequently simulated two psycholinguistic phenomena: (1) differences in the timing of resolution of tonal contrast pairs, and (2) the interaction between syllable frequency and tonal probability. In all cases, the model gave rise to results comparable to those of published data with human subjects, suggesting that it is a viable working model of spoken word recognition in Mandarin. It is our hope that this tool will be of use to practitioners studying the psycholinguistics of Mandarin Chinese and will help inspire similar models for other tonal languages, such as Cantonese and Thai.

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“…However, regarding the low-falling tone differentiation, the tone shapes are absolutely contrasting; the low tone is a static tone while the falling tone is a contour tone. This could lead to the interpretation that the perception cue lies in the pitch heightand not the shape of the tone, as reported in a number of previous research (Chen& Tucker, 2013;Tong et al, 2014). The low tone pitch height is at a low level, similar to that of the falling tone.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 74%

A Perception of Thai Tone in Chinese Students Using the Thai Tone Application: A Case Study of the Low Tone and the Falling Tone

Teeranon¹

2022

MOJET

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The use of education applications in language learning is rapidly increasing. This research aims to analyse the tonal perception ability of Chinese students using the Thai Tone Application with minimal pairs approach. The participants were divided into two groups, an experimental group (ones who studied in the class and used the application) and a control group (ones who studied in the class without using the application), of 20 students each. One-syllable words bearing low tone and falling tone were used to examine the participants’ tonal perception ability. The findings revealed that the experimental group significantly outperformed the control group in terms of differentiating between low tone and falling tone. The result of the current study furthur indicatesthe use of the mobile-assisted language learning applicationsince supplemental material may effectively enhance Thai tone perception or Thai tone learning outcomes in some Chinese students. The significance of the minimal pair approach is also discussed.

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Sonorant Onset Pitch as a Perceptual Cue of Lexical Tones in Mandarin

Cited by 8 publications

References 38 publications

Why we need to investigate casual speech to truly understand language production, processing and the mental lexicon

Why we need to investigate casual speech to truly understand language production, processing and the mental lexicon

Encoding lexical tones in jTRACE: a simulation of monosyllabic spoken word recognition in Mandarin Chinese

A Perception of Thai Tone in Chinese Students Using the Thai Tone Application: A Case Study of the Low Tone and the Falling Tone

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