Acoustic cue weighting in perception and production of English and Spanish

Abstract

We present data quantifying the use of multiple acoustic dimensions in the perception and production of word-initial stops in Spanish and English in bilinguals and monolinguals, with a focus on the stability of individuals’ cue weighting strategies across languages and modalities. Early Spanish-English bilinguals who use both languages on a regular basis, along with control groups of monolingual Spanish and English speakers, categorized stop-initial CV syllables covarying in Voice Onset Time (VOT), fundamental frequency at vowel onset (f0), first formant onset frequency (F1), and stop closure duration. Individual perceptual cue weights were calculated via logistic regression, and these weights were compared with the same speakers’ use of the corresponding acoustic dimensions in their productions of the stop contrast. Preliminary results suggest that bilingual listeners’ perceptual cue weighting strategies correspond across Spanish and English; that is, individuals who weight a given cue more heavily than average in English also weight that cue heavily in Spanish. However, in line with previous work, correspondences between a given individual's use of the acoustic dimensions across perception and production are more elusive.