Voice onset time is necessary but not always sufficient to describe acquisition of voiced stops: The cases of Greek and Japanese

Abstract

The age at which children master adult-like voiced stops can generally be predicted by voice onset time (VOT): stops with optional short lag are early, those with obligatory lead are late. However, Japanese voiced stops are late despite having a short lag variant, whereas Greek voiced stops are early despite having consistent voicing lead. This cross-sectional study examines the acoustics of word-initial stops produced by English-, Japanese-, and Greek-speaking children aged 2 to 5, to investigate how these seemingly exceptional mastery patterns relate to use of other phonetic correlates. Productions were analyzed for VOT, f0 and spectral tilt (H1-H2) in Japanese and English, and for amplitude trajectory in Greek and Japanese. Japanese voiceless stops have intermediate lag VOT values, so other “secondary” cues are needed to differentiate them from the voiced short lag VOT variant. Greek voiced stops are optionally prenasalized, and the amplitude trajectory for the voice bar during closure suggests that younger children use a greater degree of nasal venting to create the aerodynamic conditions necessary for voicing lead. Taken together, the findings suggest that VOT must be supplemented by measurements of other language-specific acoustic properties to explain the mastery pattern of voiced stops in some languages.

Percepção E Produção Dos Padrões De Vot Do Inglês Por Aprendizes Brasileiros: O Papel De Múltiplas Pistas Acústicas Sob Uma Perspectiva Dinâmica

“…This considered, it might be the case that other acoustic cues are being primarily employed in the perception and production of voice distinctions. Similar cases have been discussed in recent studies (SUNDARA, 2005;OH, 2011;KONG;BECKMAN;EDWARDS, 2012), which investigate Canadian French, Korean and Japanese, respectively. In these languages, additional cues, such as burst intensity and fundamental frequency (F0) in the following vowel, take the lead as the main acoustic correlates employed to distinguish voiceless from voiced plosive segments in perception and production.…”

“…As we found out that other acoustic cues were acting as relevant cues, it remains to be investigated which acoustic(s) cue (s) is/are being primarily followed by Brazilian learners in these voice distinctions. As already mentioned, studies by Sundara (2005), Oh (2011) and Kong, Beckman e Edwards (2012) have raised the possibility that both burst intensity and F0 seem to play a decisive role in this sense. What remains to be determined, in further studies, is which of these two acoustic cues plays a more decisive role in Brazilian Portuguese and, as a likely consequence, in Brazilian PortugueseEnglish interlanguage.…”

Establishing the Three-Way Voicing Contrast in Madurese Stops

“…It is important to bear in mind, however, that the three stop categories in Korean are all voiceless in utterance-initial position and for some speakers both F0 and voice quality also play a role for the distinction among the three categories (see e.g. Cho, Ladefoged, & Jun, 2002;Han & Weitzman, 1970;Kang & Guion, 2008;Kang, 2014;Kim & Duanmu, 2004;Kong, Beckman, & Edwards, 2012). However, in terms of vowel quality, they look very similar.…”

The effect of speaker gender and talker proficiency on the realization of Taiwan Min /dz/ among young speakers

“…Previous studies on /dz/ variation mainly focused on geographical/dialectal differences [e.g., Ang 洪惟仁 (2003Ang 洪惟仁 ( , 2012, Chang 洪惟仁, 張素蓉 (2008), Chen 陳淑娟 (1995), Chen 陳雅玲 (2010Chen 陳雅玲 ( , 2012, , Hung 洪慧鈺 (2007), Khng 康韶真 (2014), Lin 林珠彩 (1995), Thoo 涂文欽 (2009), and Wang 王薈 雯 (2014)], and little has been discussed on the potential effect of gender. However, as gender has always been a prominent factor for sound changes and variations [e.g., English: Holmes (1999); Japanese: Kong et al (2012); Mandarin: Baran (2014), Fon et al (2011), andZhang (2005); Tibetan: Reynolds (2012); Yami: Rau et al (2009)], it is surmised that there might also be a gender difference in the realization of Min /dz/. Previous research showed that the effect of gender on sound changes is not always straightforward and has more to do with the nature of the change and how it interacts with the two genders (Labov 1990;Maclagan et al 1999;Trudgill 2000).…”