Effects of stimulus duration and vowel quality in cross-linguistic categorical perception of pitch directions.

ABSTRACT: We investigated categorical perception of rising and falling pitch contours by tonal and non-tonal listeners. Specifically, we determined minimum durations needed to perceive both contours and compared to those of production, how stimuli duration affects their perception, whether there is an intrinsic F0 effect, and how first language background, duration, directions of pitch and vowel quality interact with each other. Continua of fundamental frequency on different vowels with 9 duration values were created for identification and discrimination tasks. Less time is generally needed to effectively perceive a pitch direction than to produce it. Overall, tonal listeners' perception is more categorical than non-tonal listeners. Stimuli duration plays a critical role for both groups, but tonal l

SUBMITTER: Chen S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5495489 | biostudies-literature | 2017

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature