A model of Mandarin Chinese question intonation

Abstract

Echo questions in Mandarin Chinese provide an interesting case study of the interaction between lexical tone and intonation because it appears that echo questions are distinguished from declaratives by modifying the F0 trajectory of the sentence-final lexical tone in ways that depend on the identity of that tone. The most general effect is that the offset of the final tone is higher in a question than in a declarative rendition of the same sentence. If the final tone is high or falling, F0 is raised throughout the tone, but if the final tone if low or rising, the F0 minimum is not raised in questions. We propose a quantitative analysis according to which question intonation consists of a high boundary tone realized simultaneously with the offset of the final lexical tone. Compromise between the boundary tone and targets for the lexical tone results in raising of the offset of the tone. Additional effects result from interactions with other targets pertaining to the shape of the lexical tone. For example, simply raising the offset of a falling tone would result in failure to realize a sufficiently steep fall, so the onset of the fall is raised as well.