Does the native language use of duration affect the perception of non‐native length contrasts?

Abstract

This study compared native Italian (NI) and American English (NE) speakers’ abilities to perceive Japanese phonemic length contrasts. Japanese has both vowel and consonant length contrasts, Italian has only consonant length contrast, and English has neither. The study examined to which extent the differential use of duration in their native languages affects their abilities to perceive length contrasts in an unfamiliar language. Twenty‐two monolingual NI speakers perceived Japanese words in isolation and in sentences and were asked to identify the number of moras in target words, e.g., /o.do.t.ta/ as four moras. Their test scores were compared to those of 18 NE participants [Hirata (2004)] in an analysis of variance. Group (NE, NI) was a between‐subjects factor, and context (isolation, sentences) and word type (long vowels, geminates, combination, and short segments) were within‐subjects factors. While there was no main effect of group (NI: 44.6%; NE: 39.5%), there was a significant three‐way interaction....