Speaking rate from proximal and distal contexts is used during word segmentation.

Eva Reinisch,Alexandra Jesse,James M Mcqueen

doi:10.1037/a0021923

Abstract

A series of eye-tracking and categorization experiments investigated the use of speaking-rate information in the segmentation of Dutch ambiguous-word sequences. Juncture phonemes with ambiguous durations (e.g., [s] in 'eens (s)peer,' "once (s)pear," [t] in 'nooit (t)rap,' "never staircase/quick") were perceived as longer and hence more often as word-initial when following a fast than a slow context sentence. Listeners used speaking-rate information as soon as it became available. Rate information from a context proximal to the juncture phoneme and from a more distal context was used during on-line word recognition, as reflected in listeners' eye movements. Stronger effects of distal context, however, were observed in the categorization task, which measures the off-line results of the word-recognition process. In categorization, the amount of rate context had the greatest influence on the use of rate information, but in eye tracking, the rate information's proximal location was the most important. These findings constrain accounts of how speaking rate modulates the interpretation of durational cues during word recognition by suggesting that rate estimates are used to evaluate upcoming phonetic information continuously during prelexical speech processing.

Highlights

A series of eye-tracking and categorization experiments investigated the use of speaking-rate information in the segmentation of Dutch ambiguous-word sequences
Because the use of durational cues to word segmentation has been shown to occur during the early phases of word recognition (Shatzman & McQueen, 2006), we asked whether speaking rate information is taken into account early in processing or whether it is used later to reinterpret durational cues
Listeners use speaking rate information from a preceding sentence in the identification of word boundaries cued by durational information

Summary

Introduction

A series of eye-tracking and categorization experiments investigated the use of speaking-rate information in the segmentation of Dutch ambiguous-word sequences. The amount of rate context had the greatest influence on the use of rate information, but in eye tracking, the rate information’s proximal location was the most important These findings constrain accounts of how speaking rate modulates the interpretation of durational cues during word recognition by suggesting that rate estimates are used to evaluate upcoming phonetic information continuously during prelexical speech processing. Rate information of competing speech affects phoneme perception even if the competitor speaker is at a different spatial location from the target speaker (Newman & Sawusch, 2009) This suggests that rate information is taken into account at a prelexical stage of processing, even before early processes such as perceptual grouping of speakers or stream segregation occur. Printed-word eye tracking allowed us to monitor over time how listeners’ hypotheses about upcoming words are modulated and changed over time by preceding speaking rate information

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Results

Conclusion