Winifred Strange

An effect of linguistic experience: The discrimination of [r] and [l] by native speakers of Japanese and English

To test the effect of linguistic experience on the perception of a cue that is known to be effective in distinguishing between [r] and [l] in English, 21 Japanese and 39 American adults were tested on discrimination of a set of synthetic speech-like stimuli. The 13 “speech” stimuli in this set varied in the initial stationary frequency of the third formant (F3) and its subsequent transition into the vowel over a range sufficient to produce the perception of [r a] and [l a] for American subjects and to produce [r a] (which is not in phonemic contrast to [l a ]) for Japanese subjects. Discrimination tests of a comparable set of stimuli consisting of the isolated F3 components provided a “nonspeech” control. For Americans, the discrimination of the speech stimuli was nearly categorical, i.e., comparison pairs which were identified as different phonemes were discriminated with high accuracy, while pairs which were identified as the same phoneme were discriminated relatively poorly. In comparison, discrimination of speech stimuli by Japanese subjects was only slightly better than chance for all comparison pairs. Performance on nonspeech stimuli, however, was virtually identical for Japanese and American subjects; both groups showed highly accurate discrimination of all comparison pairs. These results suggest that the effect of linguistic experience is specific to perception in the “speech mode.”

The Acquisition of /r/ and /l/ by Japanese Learners of English: Evidence That Speech Production Can Precede Speech Perception.

This study examines the relationship between the production and perception of English /r/ and /l/ by native Japanese adults learning English in the United States. For some subjects, production of the contrast was more accurate than their perception of it, replicating and extending a previous finding reported by Goto (1971) in Japan. The difficulty in perception of the liquid contrast varied with its position in the word. Prevocalic /r/ and /l/ in consonant clusters yielded the greatest perceptual errors, while word-final liquids were accurately perceived. This pattern of errors is not predictable on the basis of contrastive phonological analysis, but might be the result of acoustic-phonetic factors. Implications for second language pedagogy are discussed.

Categorical perception of English /r/ and /l/ by Japanese bilinguals

Categorical perception of a synthetic /r/-/l/ continuum was investigated with Japanese bilinguals at two levels of English language experience. The inexperienced Japanese group, referred to as Not-experienced, had had little or no previous training in English conversation. The Experienced Japanese group had had intensive training in English conversation by native American-English speakers. The tasks used were absolute identification, AXB discrimination, and oddity discrimination. Results showed classic Categorical perception by an American-English control group. The Not-experienced Japanese showed near-chance performance on all tasks, with performance no better for stimuli that straddled the /r/-/l/ boundary than for stimuli that fell in either category. The Experienced Japanese group, however, perceived /r/ and /l/ categorically. Their identification performance did not differ from the American-English controls, but their overall performance levels on the discrimination tests were somewhat lower than for the Americans. We conclude that native Japanese adults learning English as a second language are capable of Categorical perception of /r/ and /l/. Implications for perceptual training of phonemic contrasts are discussed.

Identification of vowels in "vowelless" syllables.

Traditionally, it has been held that the primary information for vowel identification is provided by formant frequencies in the quasi-steady-state portion of the spoken syllable. Recent search has advanced an alternative view that emphasizes the role of temporal factors and dynamic (time-varying) spectral information in determining the perception of vowels. Nine vowels spoken in /b/ + vowel + /b/ syllables were recorded. The syllables were modified electronically in several ways to suppress various sources of spectral and durational information. Two vowel-perception experiments were performed, testing subjects’ ability to identify vowels in these modified syllables. Results of both experiments revealed the importance of dynamic spectral information at syllable onset and offset (in its proper temporal relation) in permitting vowel identification. On the other hand, steady-state spectral information, deprived of its durational variation, was a poor basis for identification. Results constitute a challenge to traditional accounts of vowel perception and point toward important sources of dynamic information.

Role of Linguistic Experience in the Perception of Speech

Although the linguistic and psycholinguistic theories of the 1960s emphasized the predispositional and maturational aspects of language acquisition, no one denies that experiential variables have profound effects on all aspects of the development of language functions. The knowledge of a language possessed by a normal adult is a product of many years of exposure to a specific language environment. Both receptive and expressive modes of language behavior are molded by the speaker-hearer’s interaction with the linguistic community. In literate societies, the perceptual aspects of receptive language function include both vision (reading) and audition (speech perception), but, obviously, the latter is the primary mode by which language is learned and used by all normal humans. (For a comparison and contrast of the visual and auditory modes, see Kavanagh and Mattingly, 1972.)

Cross‐language study of perception of the oral–nasal distinction

To investigate the effect of linguistic experience on the perception of the oral-nasal distinction in vowels, Hindi and American English speakers were tested on identification and discrimination of four speechlike series generated by articulatory synthesis. In experiment I, no language-group differences were found in the discrimination of either a consonant series, [ba-ma] (a phonemic contrast in both languages), or a vowel series, [ba-bã] (phonemic only for the Hindi speakers). The vowel results were due to floor effects which obscured differences across language groups. Experiment II examined perception of two modified vowel series, one which increased the interval between members of discrimination pairs and one that extended the range of velar port opening. Cross-language differences in discrimination were found. Hindi perception of the oral-nasal distinction was categorical. English speakers perception of the vowel series was more continuous. They accurately discriminated differences not only across categories, but also within the oral category. These findings indicate that linguistic experience can influence listeners perception of vowels, but the effect is different from that shown for consonants.

The relationship between perception and production of /w/, /r/, and /l/ by three-year-old children☆

Abstract Twenty-one normally developing 3-year-old children were tested on two approximant consonant contrasts, rake-lake and wake-rake , and a control contrast, wake-bake . Perception was assessed in a two-choice picture identification paradigm; stimuli were (1) natural and computer synthesized “clear cases” of the minimal pairs, and (2) synthetic stimulus series which interpolated on acoustic dimensions that differentiate the minimal pairs. As a group, the children showed very accurate perception of the minimal pairs. Performance on the synthetic series yielded consistent identification of the endpoint stimuli and monotonic functions with abrupt crossovers at the phoneme boundary. Children who did not yet articulate /r/ and /l/ appropriately showed somewhat less consistent perception than children who produced all phonemes correctly.

Perception of synthetic nasal consonants in initial and final syllable position.

Identification and discrimination of synthesized syllable-initial and syllable-final nasal consonants (/mæ-næ-ηæ/ and æm-æn-æη) by adult American subjects were assessed to determine (1) whether place-of-articulation contrasts in nasals, cued only by second and third formant transition variations, were perceived categorically, and (2) if linguistic experience affected_ the perception of this acoustic dimension. In two experiments, subjects produced consistent identification functions with sharp boundaries between familiar phoneme categories. Corresponding discrimination functions showed “peaks” of relatively accurate perception for cross-category comparison pairs, indicating categorical perception. Identification consistency and discrimination accuracy were inferior for the/n/-/η/ contrast in the unfamiliar (and phonologically inappropriate) syllable-initial condition compared to the familiar syllable-final condition. No such difference was found in identification and discrimination of the acoustically comparable oral stop consonant contrast/d/-/g/in syllable-initial and syllable-final position. These results provide evidence that perception of linguistically relevant acoustic dimensions by adults is constrained, at least in part, by their familiarity with those acoustic (and phonetic) contrasts in specific phonological contexts.

The perception of /r/ and /l/ in syllable-initial and syllable-final position

American English liquids /r/ and /l/ have been considered intermediate between stop consonants and vowels acoustically, articulatorily, phonologically, and perceptually. Cutting (1947a) found position-dependent ear advantages for liquids in a dichotic listening task: syllable-initial liquids produced significant right ear advantages, while syllable-final liquids produced no reliable ear advantages. The present study employed identification and discrimination tasks to determine whether /r/and /l/ are perceived differently depending on syllable position when perception is tested by a different method. Fifteen subjects listened to two synthetically produced speech series—/li/ to /ri/ and /il/ to /ir/—in which stepwise variations of the third formant cued the difference in consonant identity. The results indicated that: (1) perception did not differ between syllable positions (in contrast to the dichotic listening results), (2) liquids in both syllable positions were perceived categorically, and (3) discrimination of a nonspeech control series did not account for the perception of the speech sounds.

Native language effects on the perception of liquids

In a study of the effect of language experience on speech perception, Miyawaki et al. (Percept. Psychophys. 1975) found classic categorical perception of the liquids [r] and [l] in native speakers of American English, but not in native Japanese, whose language lacks a liquid contrast. They tested oddity discrimination, using a synthetic [r]‐[l] continuum containing systematic variations in the F3 transition. Since the oddity task is believed to be very difficult, the current research investigated effects of the task requirements on discrimination via comparison of A × B and oddity discrimination tests with American and Japanese adults. Because spoken liquids show F1 and F2 differences in addition to the F3 difference, a new ten‐item synthetic continuum was used, which involved concurrent changes between [r] and [l] in all three formants. The American results replicated the earlier findings. Peaks and troughs in their performance on A × B and oddity tasks reflected categorical discrimination, and correspon...