Nasal place assimilation trades off inferrability of both target and trigger words
Nasal place assimilation trades off inferrability of both target and trigger words
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鼻音同化权衡了目标词和触发词的可推断性
作者：
Rory Turnbull;S. Seyfarth;E. Hume;T. Jaeger
在英语中，鼻音位置同化发生在单词边界之外，例如 10 Bucks 发音为 te[m] Bucks。同化可以被视为同化目标的位置提示（/n/ 以十为单位）的减少或丢失，同时通过在信号中较早地传播其位置提示来增强同化触发器的位置提示（/b/ 以美元为单位）。面向消息的语音方法预测，同化对目标词和触发词的相对上下文可推断性很敏感：对于上下文更可预测的目标词，应该观察到更多的同化，而对于上下文更可预测的触发词，应该观察到更少的同化。这些预测偏离了将同化仅仅视为减少的观点。为了测试这些预测，从会话语音语料库中提取了允许同化的序列。分析了分类同化（基于紧密语音转录）和梯度声学同化（基于 F2）。正如预测的那样，当像“十”这样的目标的可预测性较高以及其触发力的可预测性较低时，同化的可能性就更大。因此，同化既起到减少作用，又起到增强作用，并且可以用于管理语音信号中的冗余。更广泛地说，这构成了交际压力对音韵学影响的证据。
In English, nasal place assimilation occurs across word boundaries, such as ten bucks pronounced as te[m] bucks. Assimilation can be viewed as a reduction or loss of the assimilation target’s place cue (/n/ in ten), and simultaneously as an enhancement of the assimilation trigger’s place cue (/b/ in bucks) by spreading its place cue earlier in the signal. A message-oriented phonological approach predicts that assimilation is sensitive to the relative contextual inferrability of both the target and trigger words: More assimilation should be observed for more contextually predictable target words, while less assimilation should be observed for contextually more predictable trigger words. These predictions deviate from accounts that view assimilation solely as reduction. To test these predictions, sequences which license assimilation were extracted from a conversational speech corpus. Both categorical assimilation (based on close phonetic transcription) and gradient acoustic assimilation (based on F2) were analyzed. As predicted, assimilation was more likely both when a target like ten was high in predictability and when its trigger bucks was low in predictability. Assimilation thus serves as both reduction and enhancement, and can be used to manage redundancy in the speech signal. More broadly, this constitutes evidence for the influence of communicative pressures on phonology.