The perception of Mandarin tone contrasts: A cross-linguistic study

Abstract

Previous studies of the perception of tone continua found that Mandarin listeners perceive tones more categorically than French listeners, whose performance is essentially psychophysically motivated. In this study, we examined native-language effects on the perception of Mandarin tone continua by Cantonese, Thai, and Japanese listeners. Cantonese distinguishes six tones: high-rising, low-rising, low-falling, and high-, mid-, and low level. Thai has five tones: rising, falling, and high-, mid-, and low level. Standard Japanese has a word pitch accent with at most one LH and one HL pitch movement per word. Listeners of these languages were tested on three Mandarin tone continua constructed from natural utterances within carrier sentences. Listeners were run on AXB identification and discrimination tests on isolated syllables. Japanese, Thai, and Cantonese listeners, in that order, perceived tones increasingly categorically. Cantonese and Thai listeners were more sensitive to tone-contour differences than Japanese listeners, although less than Mandarin listeners. The Cantonese and Thai data show that both phonological and phonetic properties of the native language affect the perception of the non-native Mandarin tones. The findings are compared with prior cross-linguistic research, and discussed with reference to the suprasegmental phonological differences across languages.