The perception of the low‐high (LH) tonal sequence

Abstract

It has been reported that the primary cue for the HL tonal perception in Japanese is not the actual F0 peak location but rather a falling F0 contour. The F0 fall may be significantly delayed, resulting in the F0 peak within the L‐toned syllable. Furthermore, it was found earlier that (1) the later the F0 fall in the L‐toned syllable, the steeper the fall rate required and (2) the fall must begin within the first two‐thirds of the duration of the vowel in the L‐toned syllable. The present experiment investigates whether a lack of synchronization between F0 change and syllable boundary can be found in the perception of the LH as well. Synthesized nonsense words/mamama/were prepared in such a way that both the onset of F0 rise and the F0 peak occur at various locations, while maintaining the overall F0 contour (level‐rise‐peak‐slight fall). The stimuli were presented to native speakers of Japanese to determine the boundary between the categorical perception of LHH and LLH. The results show that the LH sequence is more constrained than the HL in terms of temporal alignment of F0 change and the syllable boundary.