Use what you can: storage, abstraction processes, and perceptual adjustments help listeners recognize reduced forms

Abstract

Three eye-tracking experiments tested whether native listeners recognized reduced Dutch words better after having heard the same reduced words, or different reduced words of the same reduction type and whether familiarization with one reduction type helps listeners to deal with another reduction type. In the exposure phase, a segmental reduction group was exposed to /b/-reductions (e.g., minderij instead of binderij, “book binder”) and a syllabic reduction group was exposed to full-vowel deletions (e.g., p'raat instead of paraat, “ready”), while a control group did not hear any reductions. In the test phase, all three groups heard the same speaker producing reduced-/b/ and deleted-vowel words that were either repeated (Experiments 1 and 2) or new (Experiment 3), but that now appeared as targets in semantically neutral sentences. Word-specific learning effects were found for vowel-deletions but not for /b/-reductions. Generalization of learning to new words of the same reduction type occurred only if the exposure words showed a phonologically consistent reduction pattern (/b/-reductions). In contrast, generalization of learning to words of another reduction type occurred only if the exposure words showed a phonologically inconsistent reduction pattern (the vowel deletions; learning about them generalized to recognition of the /b/-reductions). In order to deal with reductions, listeners thus use various means. They store reduced variants (e.g., for the inconsistent vowel-deleted words) and they abstract over incoming information to build up and apply mapping rules (e.g., for the consistent /b/-reductions). Experience with inconsistent pronunciations leads to greater perceptual flexibility in dealing with other forms of reduction uttered by the same speaker than experience with consistent pronunciations.

Perceptual adaptation to segmental and syllabic reductions in continuous spoken Dutch

“…It therefore seems most likely that the effects observed here are due primarily to learning about the reduced forms and not to learning about the quasi-canonical forms. Note that we have also observed adaptation to reductions if the contrast sounds (corresponding to the quasi-canonical stimuli in the present study) were not manipulated (Poellmann, Mitterer, & McQueen, 2014).…”

Speaker-specific processing and local context information: The case of speaking rate

“…Such a modulation of processing has been demonstrated with other aspects of context situations (Brouwer, Mitterer, & Huettig, 2012;McQueen & Huettig, 2012;Poellmann, Mitterer, & McQueen, 2014). That is, when listening to clear speech, listeners give special weight to segments in word onset to modulate lexical access and identify the word that is being said.…”

“…That is, when listening to clear speech, listeners give special weight to segments in word onset to modulate lexical access and identify the word that is being said. However, if context information suggests that the segments in the word onset may be less reliable than expected because the context is partially masked by radio noise (McQueen & Huettig, 2012) or contains segmental reductions in casual speech (Brouwer et al, 2012; Poellmann et al, 2014), then listeners reduce their reliance on word-initial segments in spoken-word recognition. Segmental mismatches in word-onset position thus cause less bottom-up inhibition in accessing acoustically similar words.…”

English Listeners Use Suprasegmental Cues to Lexical Stress Early During Spoken-Word Recognition

“…momentary degree of overall support for this word as a lexical candidate (Allopenna et al, 1998). The visual world paradigm with pictures or with printed words can capture the time course of phonological (segmental) competition among lexical candidates (e.g., Huettig & McQueen, 2007;McQueen & Viebahn, 2007;Poellmann, Mitterer, & McQueen, 2014;Reinisch, Jesse, & McQueen, 2011a;Salverda & Tanenhaus, 2010) and is sensitive to how prosodic information alters online spoken-word recognition in various languages (e.g., Ito & Speer, 2008;Reinisch et al, 2010;Salverda et al, 2003Salverda et al, , 2007. Most relevant to the present study, in a visual world paradigm with printed words, Dutch listeners used suprasegmental information associated with the primary-stressed syllable of accentuated words to speed up spoken-word recognition and to resolve lexical competition before the target words became segmentally unique (Reinisch et al, 2010).…”