Vowel Length Research Articles

Sociophonological Gender Variations of EFL Iraqi Students

This study employs a mixed-methods approach to examine the phonological challenges faced by Iraqi EFL learners, focusing on gender-based differences and the influence of Iraqi Arabic phonology on English pronunciation. Iraqi Arabic presents unique phonological characteristics—such as dark [??], trilled [r?], and vowel length distinctions—that can complicate the acquisition of English phonology. The study explores two research questions: (1) What phonological features do Iraqi EFL learners struggle with, and how do these differ by gender? (2) How does Iraqi Arabic phonology influence English pronunciation among male and female learners? A quantitative methodology was employed, analyzing speech samples from 50 participants, with frequency counts used to identify patterns. The findings show that both genders struggle with phonological features such as dark [??], trilled [r?], vowel lengthening, monophthongization, and epenthesis. However, gender differences are evident, with males showing higher frequencies of traditional phonological features, while females tend to approximate English norms more closely. These results confirm the significant influence of Iraqi Arabic phonology on English pronunciation, with sociolinguistic factors shaping learners' adaptation strategies. The study contributes to sociophonology and Arabic sociolinguistics and offers practical insights for EFL pedagogy, suggesting targeted pronunciation instruction to address specific challenges faced by Arabic-speaking learners.Keywords: Iraqi EFL learners, phonological variation, gender differences, Iraqi Arabic phonology, sociophonology, pronunciation challenges

VARIABILITY OF SPELLING SYSTEMS IN ROMANI DICTIONARIES PUBLISHED IN HUNGARY BETWEEN 1797 AND 1935

The study argues that based on the analysis of 48 Hungarian Romani dictionaries, the works can be chronologically dated, and the first phase (1797–1935) is also important from an orthographic point of view since in this period we find spontaneous writing systems that were no longer used for scientific or educational purposes. The analysis has revealed that the choice of letters was not only motivated by individual intuition and mutual copying but also by an intended adaptation to Hungarian orthography and the written representation of special sounds in the Romani language. This resulted in a high degree of variability. In addition, sounds were marked inconsistently, with special regard to vowel length, aspirated sounds, and the velar fricative. This general inconsistency means that the sources do not come from a single informant even if the author said so and that a thorough examination of the dictionaries requires knowledge based on fieldwork so that a distinction can be made between error and dialectal variation.

Phonological development of children with cochlear implants

ABSTRACT Phonological processes are examples of normal simplified articulation seen in all children during the language and speech sound acquisition phase, and their frequency decreases and disappears with age. They are of concern when they are used beyond the expected time frames or when the simplification processes do not follow the typical substitutions. The aim of this study was to examine the phonological development and consonant acquisition of Turkish-speaking children with CI and compare the results with normative data. Comparisons were made according to the duration of CI use and also according to the age of CI. Therefore, 52 participants were analysed, first divided into 4 groups according to duration of CI use and then into 2 groups according to age of CI. Phonology skills were evaluated with the Bankson-Bernthal Phonology Test. In children with CI, 1373 consonant production errors were detected. There were 28 phonological processes corresponding to these errors. The most common phonological processes were Initial Consonant Deletion, Cluster Reduction, Final Consonant Deletion, Vowel Lengthening, Devoicing, Assimilation, Nasalization and Dentalization. The most errors occurred in fricative and voiced sounds, and the fewest errors occurred in bilabial consonants (/b,/p,/m/). This study demonstrated that CI performed before the age of three years and continued use of CI over an extended period of time have beneficial impacts on the development of phonological skills. This study is thought to enhance the existing research on the acquisition of consonants and phonological development in Turkish-speaking children with CI, a topic that currently lacks sufficient information.

Neural processing of speech sounds at premature and term birth: ERPs and MMR between 32 and 42 weeks of gestation

Prenatal listening experience reportedly modulates how humans process speech at birth, but little is known about how speech perception develops throughout the perinatal period. The present experiment assessed the neural event-related potentials (ERP) and mismatch responses (MMR) to native vowels in 99 neonates born between 32 and 42 weeks of gestation. The vowels elicited reliable ERPs in newborns whose gestational age at time of experiment was at least 36 weeks and 1 day (36 + 1). The ERPs reflected spectral distinctions between vowel onsets from age 36 weeks + 6 days and durational distinctions at vowel offsets from age 37 weeks + 6 days. Starting at age 40 + 4, there was evidence of neural discrimination of vowel length, indexed by a negative MMR response. The present findings extend our understanding of the earliest stages of speech perception development in that they pinpoint the ages at which the cortex reliably responds to the phonetic characteristics of individual speech sounds and discriminates a native phoneme contrast. The age at which the brain reliably differentiates vowel onsets coincides with what is considered term age in many countries (37 weeks + 0 days of gestational age). Future studies should investigate to what extent the perinatal maturation of the cortical responses to speech sounds is modulated by the ambient language.

The Influence of L1 Phonological Features on the Perception of Voicing-conditioned Vowel Length Differences in English by Mongolian Learners of English

The Influence of L1 Phonological Features on the Perception of Voicing-conditioned Vowel Length Differences in English by Mongolian Learners of English

The interaction of tonal alignment with vowel length and syllable structure in Lebanese Arabic

Research on a variety of languages has shown that tonal alignment in pitch accents can be influenced by segmental factors such as syllable structure, onset type, and phonological vowel length (e.g., Ladd et al., 2000; Maddieson, 1997). However, the majority of work on these topics has been on European languages. The current study examines the interaction of these factors in the Beirut dialect of Lebanese Arabic. Disyllabic words with initial, stressed syllables that were either open or closed and contained either a long or a short vowel and had a simple or complex onset were examined when non-focused and in contrastive focus. Contrastive focus was associated with a wider f0 range. The focus pitch accent was H* or L+H*. In terms of segmental effects, neither vowel length nor syllable structure had a significant effect on tonal alignment. Timing of the f0 peak was found to be consistently about 45 msec from vowel onset. This study contributes to the literature on tonal alignment by examining a variety of Arabic that is understudied in terms of intonation.

Vpliv besednega naglasa na zaznavo dolžine japonskega samoglasnika: Dokazi iz hrvaščine

The present paper examines the effect of Japanese lexical accent on the perception of Japanese vowel length in Croatian listeners. Lexical accent patterns of the two languages, both having phonologically distinctive length and pitch, are contrasted. A three-alternative choice identification test was conducted involving all combinations of three pitch patterns and two positions of a long vowel in bisyllabic words. Two groups of participants were Croatian students of Japanese and those without any prior knowledge. The results showed not only the effects of pitch pattern but also of the position of the long vowel (initial or final) and group. Participants had the highest error rates for pitch pattern LHL, followed by HLL, regardless of the group and position of the long vowel.

The developmental pattern of native and non-native speech perception during the 1st year of life in Japanese infants

Language development during the 1st year of life is characterized by perceptual attunement: following language-general perception, a decline in the perception of non-native phonemes and a parallel increase in or maintenance of the perception of native phonemes. While this general pattern is well established, there are still many gaps in the literature. First, most evidence documenting these patterns comes from “Minority world countries” with only a limited number of studies from “Majority world countries”, limiting the range of languages and contrasts assessed. Second, few studies test both the developmental patterns of native and non-native speech perception in the same group of infants, making it hard to draw conclusions on simultaneous decline in non-native and increase in native speech perception. Such limitations are in part due to the effort that goes into testing developing speech sound perception, where usually only discrimination of one contrast per infant can be tested at a time. The present study thus set out to assess the feasibility of assessing a given infant on their discrimination of two speech sound contrasts during the same lab visit. It leveraged the presence of documented patterns of the improvement of native and the decline of non-native phoneme discrimination abilities in Japanese, therefore assessing native and non-native speech perception in Japanese infants from 6 to 12 months of age. Results demonstrated that 76 % of infants contributed discrimination data for both contrasts. We found a decline in non-native speech perception evident in discrimination of the non-native /ɹ/-/l/ consonant contrast at 9–11, but not at 11–13 months of age. Additionally, a parallel increase in native speech perception was demonstrated evident in an absence of native phonemic vowel length discrimination at 6–7 and 9–11 months and a discrimination of this contrast at 11–13 months of age. These results, based on a simultaneous assessment of native and non-native speech perception in Japanese-learning infants, demonstrate the feasibility of assessing the discrimination of two contrasts in one testing session and corroborate theoretical proposals on two hallmarks of perceptual attunement: a decrease in non-native and a facilitation in native speech perception during the first year of life.

K’abeena phonology

The article provides descriptive analysis of the phonology of K'abeena, a language belonging to the Afro-Asian phylum, spoken in central Ethiopia. In this article, I identify 25 consonant phonemes and 3 loan phonemes. The loan phonemes are included as they are used in the current language's orthography. The language has five vowels. Vowel length and Gemination of consonants are phonemic in the language. With the exception of /h/ and /f/, which never geminate in the language, the rest of the consonant phonemes appear together to geminate. This only happens in the medial position of the words. Consonant clusters are allowed in word medial position with a maximum of two consonants. The phonological process identified in this article involves processes like assimilation, palatalization and deletion. Kabeena does not appear to be a pitch-accent language, but further research is needed to establish confirmed statements.

Individual differences in the use of top-down versus bottom-up cues to resolve phonetic ambiguity.

How listeners weight a wide variety of information to interpret ambiguities in the speech signal is a question of interest in speech perception, particularly when understanding how listeners process speech in the context of phrases or sentences. Dominant views of cue use for language comprehension posit that listeners integrate multiple sources of information to interpret ambiguities in the speech signal. Here, we study how semantic context, sentence rate, and vowel length all influence identification of word-final stops. We find that while at the group level all sources of information appear to influence how listeners interpret ambiguities in speech, at the level of the individual listener, we observe systematic differences in cue reliance, such that some individual listeners favor certain cues (e.g., speech rate and vowel length) to the exclusion of others (e.g., semantic context). While listeners exhibit a range of cue preferences, across participants we find a negative relationship between individuals' weighting of semantic and acoustic-phonetic (sentence rate, vowel length) cues. Additionally, we find that these weightings are stable within individuals over a period of 1 month. Taken as a whole, these findings suggest that theories of cue integration and speech processing may fail to capture the rich individual differences that exist between listeners, which could arise due to mechanistic differences between individuals in speech perception.

Revisiting the nature and the context of T4 alternations: insights from disyllabic, trisyllabic and quadrisyllabic word/digit productions in Taiwan Mandarin.

The tone values of a Tone 4 (T4) syllable are conventionally assumed to change from '51' to '53' when the syllable is followed by another T4 syllable in Mandarin Chinese. Literature focusing on T4 alternation is still inconclusive regarding the contexts for the alternations and whether the phenomenon should be better categorized as tone sandhi (i.e.,represented as an abstract phonological rule in mental grammar) or tonal coarticulation (i.e.,a natural articulation phenomenon at the phonetic level). The current study probes into these issues by focusing on disyllabic pseudowords, right-branching trisyllabic words as well as unstructured trisyllabic and quadrisyllabic digits. Productions from a total of 148 participants were collected and fundamental frequency (f0) contours, vowel lengths and f0 slopes were included in the analysis. The results from the experiments supported the tonal coarticulation view and showed that the trigger for the alternations was the high-onset tones following T4. Implications to the phonological analysis on tonal alternations in Mandarin Chinese are discussed.

THE ROLE OF L1 PROSODY IN L2 VOWEL DURATION PRODUCTION: EVIDENCE FROM ASIAN LEARNERS OF ENGLISH

The pre-fortis clipping pattern refers to vowels being shorter before voiceless consonants compared to vowels before voiced consonants. This study examined whether first-language (L1) prosodic properties affect the production of this vowel duration pattern in second-language (L2) English speech. Native speakers of Mandarin Chinese, Vietnamese, Korean, and Japanese with varying English proficiency participated in a production experiment. Results showed that while speakers exhibited some pre-fortis clipping, there were no significant vowel lengthening patterns. Additional analysis revealed subtle differences based on the L1 prosody type. Native Mandarin and Vietnamese speakers, with lexical tone, had similar duration ratios. However, native Korean speakers, with no tone, showed less distinction in vowel duration by consonant voicing. Japanese speakers, with pitch accents, fell in the middle. The findings provide limited evidence that L1 prosody affects L2 vowel duration production. The results have implications for theories of L2 speech acquisition as well as pedagogical techniques when teaching English vowels.<p> </p><p><strong> Article visualizations:</strong></p><p><img src="/-counters-/soc/0711/a.php" alt="Hit counter" /></p>

A Stratal Phonological Analysis of Stem-Level and Word-Level Effects in Old French Compensatory Vowel Lengthening upon Coda /s/ Deletion

A Stratal Phonological Analysis of Stem-Level and Word-Level Effects in Old French Compensatory Vowel Lengthening upon Coda /s/ Deletion

Optimization-based planning of speech articulation using general Tau Theory

This paper presents a model of speech articulation planning and generation based on General Tau Theory and Optimal Control Theory. Because General Tau Theory assumes that articulatory targets are always reached, the model accounts for speech variation via context-dependent articulatory targets. Targets are chosen via the optimization of a composite objective function. This function models three different task requirements: maximal intelligibility, minimal articulatory effort and minimal utterance duration. The paper shows that systematic phonetic variability can be reproduced by adjusting the weights assigned to each task requirement. Weights can be adjusted globally to simulate different speech styles, and can be adjusted locally to simulate different levels of prosodic prominence. The solution of the optimization procedure contains Tau equation parameter values for each articulatory movement, namely position of the articulator at the movement offset, movement duration, and a parameter which relates to the shape of the movement’s velocity profile. The paper presents simulations which illustrate the ability of the model to predict or reproduce several well-known characteristics of speech. These phenomena include close-to-symmetric velocity profiles for articulatory movement, variation related to speech rate, centralization of unstressed vowels, lengthening of stressed vowels, lenition of unstressed lingual stop consonants, and coarticulation of stop consonants.

A Non-Linear Analysis of Foreign English Words in Standard Arabic

This study aimed to analyze the foreign English loanwords in Standard Arabic within the framework of a non-linear phonology (autosegmental phonology). The analysis of the data focused on selected phonological processes such as: consonantal substitutions including voicing, devoicing, velarization, fortition. Moreover, it covers the phonological process of assimilation, comprising palatalization, labialization, nasalization, and vowel harmony. Furthermore, vowel lengthening and shortening phonological processes were identified in the collected data. The sample of the study is collected from six sources: Said (1976), Zughoul and Hussein (1993), Al-Saqqa (2001), Mukkaram (2006), Salem (2015), and Abu Guba (2016). Finally, the study showed that autosegmental theory provides an adequate analysis in explaining certain phonological processes when dealing with English loanwords.

Acoustic, phonetic, and phonological features of Drehu vowels.

This study presents an acoustic investigation of the vowel inventory of Drehu (Southern Oceanic Linkage), spoken in New Caledonia. Reportedly, Drehu has a 14 vowel system distinguishing seven vowel qualities and an additional length distinction. Previous phonological descriptions were based on impressionistic accounts showing divergent proposals for two out of seven reported vowel qualities. This study presents the first phonetic investigation of Drehu vowels based on acoustic data from eight speakers. To examine the phonetic correlates of the proposed phonological vowel inventory, multi-point acoustic analyses were used, and vowel inherent spectral change (VISC) was investigated (F1, F2, and F3). Additionally, vowel duration was measured. Contrary to reports from other studies on VISC in monophthongs, we find that monophthongs in Drehu are mostly steady state. We propose a revised vowel inventory and focus on the acoustic description of open-mid /ɛ/ and the central vowel /ə/, whose status was previously unclear. Additionally, we find that vowel quality stands orthogonal to vowel quantity by demonstrating that the phonological vowel length distinction is primarily based on a duration cue rather than formant structure. Finally, we report the acoustic properties of the seven vowel qualities that were identified.

An acoustic study on age-related changes in vowel production of Chinese

This paper investigates the relationship between vowel production and age using speech data from 109 Chinese L1 speakers (61 females and 48 males) covering an age range of 20 to 80 years. Acoustical estimation of vocal tract length (VTL) as well as multiple acoustic metrics are analyzed with generalized additive mixed models (GAMM). The results indicate that: (1) After controlling for VTL, F0 and duration, vowels show a centralization trend with increasing age, with a more significant effect observed in female speakers; (2) VTL does not significantly change with age; (3) The patterns observed in vowel distinctiveness and duration may present evidence contradicting the notion of vowel lengthening as a compensatory mechanism; (4) The patterns of age-related changes in different measurements and different genders are diverse. The U-shaped change patterns are found in the male speakers and the age around 50 may serve as a turning point. Based on these findings, we have explored some possible reasons for inconsistent conclusions in previous studies. The physiological aging phenomena of vowel production and potential compensatory mechanisms on motor control abilities, as well as other possible influencing factors, are also discussed.

Tense and Lax Vowels in the Lahu Dialect of Yunshan: A Laboratory Phonological Study

A controversy exists regarding whether there are tense-lax vowels in Lahu and whether tense-lax phonation should be accorded phonological status, an issue that is closely related to the physiological movement of the larynx. This study presents an experimental analysis of the acoustic features of the Lahu dialect of Yunshan, using electroglottography to collect acoustic and physiological data and employing VoiceSauce and Eggworks to extract glottal features to explore laryngeal mode of motion. The study demonstrates a distinct tense-lax phonation contrast in Yunshan Lahu, which is characterized by multiple types of phonation, differences between front and back parts of tense vowels, and equal importance of tense-lax contrast and vowel length. To contribute to a systematic description of Tibeto-Burman language, this paper proposes to treat tense-lax contrast as the main feature in phonological induction, using length as its accompanying feature for explanation. From the perspective of the path of historical evolution, tenseness comes from the loss of plosive codas, and is also closely related to voiced, aspirated initials. In the process of transforming tense-lax features to tones, tense vowels retained their features of tenseness as a result of falling tones.

Speech adaptation in conversation: Effects of segment cue-weighting strategy for non-native speakers

Research has investigated how speakers make phonetic adaptations by adjusting their speech sounds to either converge to or diverge from their interlocutor’s. Less is known about the dynamic adaptive strategies non-native speakers use to improve intelligibility when interacting with native speakers, particularly how their strategies change over the course of spontaneous conversations. The current study examines phonetic adaptations in English words contrasting tense and lax vowels (e.g., sheep-ship) in unscripted conversations between non-native Japanese English and native English speakers during an engaging computer game task. Japanese speakers have previously been found to rely on temporal cues (vowel length) for tensity distinctions due to their L1 cue-weighting strategy rather than spectral cues (vowel quality) that are predominantly used in English. Acoustic analyses are conducted to examine changes in non-native vowel productions before, during and after the conversation task. We predict that, in an attempt to overcome miscommunication, non-native speakers may initially lengthen the tense vowels to distinguish them from their lax counterparts. As the conversation progresses, non-native speakers may adapt to a more native-like cue-weighting pattern by shifting to spectral distinctions. Results are discussed in terms of adaptations to cue-weighting strategies for intelligibility gains by interlocutors of different linguistic backgrounds.

Analisis Morfofonemik Dialek Lamalera

This research is entitled "Morphophonemic Analysis of Lamalera Dialect". This title was taken as research because the Lmalera dialect is the Lamaholot language and has its own identity in the form of vowel lengthening in the previous syllable. This morphophonemic work is determined on the influence of morphemes and phonemes as well as grammatical influence. The formulation of the problem in this study is how Lamalera morphophonemic which includes morpheme and phoneme effects and grammatical effects of Lamalera dialect. The purpose of this study is to find out the morphophonemic process of Lamalera dialect in the form of morpheme and phoneme effects and grammatical effects of Lamalera dialect. The method in this research uses the listening method and the chap method, while the data analysis technique in this research is descriptive. The reason the researcher uses this technique is a way used by researchers to process data which will then be descriptive in detail the results of observations of the data that has been collected. The conclusion of this study states that, nouns ending in the vowel /a/ will change to the nasal vowel /a^/ in the form of the second person singular owner. Lamalera dialect has a joint where -an changes into /a^/, there is also a morphophonemical change which is the lengthening of the vowel in the previous syllable. When due to other grammatical elements that follow the vowel changes /e^/ and /o/, the vowel changes /e^/ and /o/ in nouns. If the vowel /e"/ is preceded by another vowel, the morphophonemic changes will follow the pattern below: the final vowel /e"/ preceded by the vowel /a/ only takes a morphophonemic change to /i/.