The Perceptual Interaction between Schwa Deletion and English Phonotactic Constraints

Abstract

This study explored the perceptual interaction between schwa deletion and English phonotactic constraints by conducting syllable-count experiments on native English and Korean and Japanese learners of English, using English nonce word stimuli. The results of both response accuracy and latency showed that English were abel to discriminate between legal and illegal onset clusters in English resulting from schwa deletion, regardless of the number of the syllables of the stimuli. However, Korean and Japanese learners of English were not sensitive to English phonotactic constraints on legal vs. illegal onset sequences created by schwa deletion. Similarly, English speakers perception of illegal onsets resulting from schwa deletion conformed to the predictions of the sonority-based onset markedness in that their perception of onsets of sonority rises was more accurate and faster than sonority levels and falls in order. On the contrary, Korean and Japanese learners of English displayed a partial sensitivity to the onset-markedness, as the mean accuracy of sonority plateaus was higher than that of sonority rises and as the number of the syllables of the stimulus items also affected the general results. Overall, the results indicate that English phonotactic restrictions as well as the sonority-driven onset-markedness play a role in the perception of onset sequences resulting from schwa deletion. The implications of the results for speech perception, markedness, and lexical representation were further discussed.