Prosodic Weight Effect on Focal Accent of Standard Chinese

Abstract

This study investigates the phonetic performance of narrow information focus, as compared to broad focus, within different sentential positions of the Chinese Subject-Verb-Object (S+V+O) syntax structure. Three acoustic parameters of focus, including the pitch range ratio, duration ratio, and intensity ratio, were taken to explore the ranking among these parameters and to analyse the impact of focus position on their interrelationships. The results showed that (1) Chinese, as a tonal language, exhibits a prosodic ranking characterized by duration > pitch range > intensity; (2) Chinese speakers tend to emphasize verbs within the S+V+O syntax structure, particularly when verbs are positioned in the middle of sentences. The prosodic ranking observed was Fmiddle > Finitial > Ffinal; (3) Pitch range and duration display interdependence as acoustic parameters, whereas intensity stands as an independent parameter. These results contribute to a deeper understanding of phonetic nuances within Chinese prosody, shedding light on the intricate interplay between focus, syntax, and prosody.