Disyllabic word context effects on cue weighting in Mandarin tone perception and production

Abstract

This study aims to examine effects of the disyllabic tonal context on native Chinese speakers' cue weighting for perceiving and producing target Mandarin Tone 2 and Tone 3 that share similar pitch contours. The speech materials were disyllabic Mandarin words, matched by word frequency and familiarity. Acoustic manipulations for the perception test included four key parameters, including fundamental frequency (F0) at tone onset, F0 at turning point, the timing of turning point and F0 at tone offset, which characterized the pitch contours of Tone 2 and Tone 3. Thirty native Chinese speakers participated in this study. These synthetic disyllabic stimuli were used in an identification task. Production of the target tones in the disyllabic context was also recorded from each participant. Cue weights for the key acoustic parameters were assessed with logistic regression analyses and linear discriminant analyses to model the extent to which each acoustic cue predicted category membership in the perception and production data. The results demonstrated strong perceptual weighting sensitivity to the disyllabic context in native Chinese speakers. The results are discussed with respect to the dynamics of tone perception and production in word contexts and potential implications for Chinese as a second language learners.