No perceptual reorganization for Limburgian tones? A cross-linguistic investigation with 6- to 12-month-old infants.

Abstract

Despite the fact that many of the world's languages use lexical tone, the majority of language acquisition studies has focused on non-tone languages. Research on tone languages has typically investigated well-known tone languages such as Mandarin and Cantonese Chinese. The current study looked at a Limburgian dialect of Dutch that uses lexical pitch differences, albeit in a rather restricted way. Using a visual habituation paradigm, 6- to 12-month-old Limburgian and Dutch infants were tested for their ability to discriminate Limburgian tones. The results showed that both Limburgian and Dutch infants discriminate the Limburgian tones throughout their first year of life. The role of linguistic experience, acoustic salience, and the degree of similarity to the native prosodic system are discussed.