Gradient phonemic contrast in Nanjing Mandarin

Abstract

The variety of Mandarin Chinese spoken in Nanjing does not have a contrast between [n] and [l]. The standard variety of Mandarin which is now taught in schools in Nanjing does have the contrast. Prior research has shown that listeners' subjective impression of sound similarity is modulated by linguistic experience. When sounds are contrastive in a language they sound more different than when they are not contrastive. We conducted an experiment to test the subjective perceptual consequences of lack of [n]/[l] contrast in Nanjing, and of learning the standard variety of Mandarin in school. The stimuli were seven instances each of [tana] [tala] and [tara]. The listeners were 16 younger (< 45 yrs) and 16 older speakers of Nanjing Mandarin, and 35 speakers of American English. The listeners' task was to rate on a 5 point scale their subjective impression of the difference between the words (1 = similar, 5 = different). For American English listeners [l]/[r] pairs and [n]/[r] pairs were rated as different (3.8) while [n]/[l] pairs were heard as a little more similar than this (3.3). For older Nanjing Mandarin speakers [l]/[r] and [n]/[r] pairs were very different (4.8) and [n]/[l] pairs were very similar (1.5). Younger Nanjing Mandarin speakers also rated [l]/[r] and [n]/[r] pairs as very different (4.6), while the [n]/[l] pairs were not as similar (2.25) (standard errors < 0.1). Exposure to a non-native phonological contrast seems to have perceptually enhanced it gradiently.