Obtaining prominence judgments from naïve listeners – Influence of rating scales, linguistic levels and normalisation

Konferenzbeitrag

A frequently replicated finding is that higher frequency words tend to be shorter and contain more strongly reduced vowels. However, little is known about potential differences in the articulatory gestures for high vs. low frequency words. The present study made use of electromagnetic articulography to investigate the production of two German vowels, [i] and [a], embedded in high and low frequency words. We found that word frequency differently affected the production of [i] and [a] at the temporal as well as the gestural level. Higher frequency of use predicted greater acoustic durations for long vowels; reduced durations for short vowels; articulatory trajectories with greater tongue height for [i] and more pronounced downward articulatory trajectories for [a]. These results show that the phonological contrast between short and long vowels is learned better with experience, and challenge both the Smooth Signal Redundancy Hypothesis and current theories of German phonology.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

Classification and Topics

• Subject: Sprache

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Arnold, Denis ; Wagner, Petra ; Möbius, Bernd
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): International Speech Communications Association
• (when): 2017-03-08

Further information

• URN: urn:nbn:de:bsz:mh39-59602
• Last update: 06.03.2025, 9:00 AM CET