Perceptual correlates of syllable weight

在国家科学基金会的支持下，马修·戈登博士将开发一个听觉系统对言语刺激反应的计算模型。这个听觉模型将允许对世界语言中声音系统的许多不同属性进行定量调查，包括本研究的重点，跨语言普遍存在的重量敏感重音现象：某些“重”音节的重音吸引。本研究将探索听觉因素，而不是严格的声学因素，在重量敏感的重音系统中所起的作用：特别是，该研究将调查语言优先重音音节比其他音节更有听觉突出性的假设。该项目通过收集和定量分析十种语言的语音数据，包括几种未得到充分研究和濒临灭绝的语言，超越了其他关于声音系统听觉基础的工作。该研究还包括一项感知实验，该实验表明，即使在没有重量敏感重音的语言中，驱动重量敏感重音的听觉因素也是普遍存在的。最后，本研究还将在跨语言的基础上探索重量和音节结构之间可能的相关性，以深入了解获得重音系统的相关因素。本研究旨在探讨语音的声学和听觉系统对语音的感知之间的关系，从而有助于我们对世界上各种语言的声音系统的理解。这项研究的结果将是一个公开可用的听觉模型，它不仅将解释重量敏感的重音现象，这是研究的重点，而且还将提供对其他几个语言特征的见解，包括声音清单和音节结构。此外，对重音和音节结构之间的相关性的研究将有助于我们理解儿童如何获得声音系统。这项研究的另一个好处是，它拓宽了我们对一些未被充分研究和濒危语言的认识。

With National Science Foundation support, Dr. Matthew Gordon will develop a computational model of the auditory system's response to speech stimuli. This auditory model will allow for quantitative investigation of a number of different properties of sound systems in languages of the world, including the focus of this study, the cross-linguistically pervasive phenomenon of weight-sensitive stress: the attraction of stress by certain "heavy" syllables. This research will explore the role that auditory, as opposed to strictly acoustic, factors play in weight-sensitive stress systems: in particular,the study will investigate the hypothesis that languages preferentially stress syllables that have greater auditory prominence than other syllables. The project goes beyond other work on the auditory basis for sound systems by collecting and quantitatively analyzing phonetic data from ten languages, including several understudied and endangered languages. The study also includes a perception experiment demonstrating that the auditory factors driving weight-sensitive stress are universal, even in languages lacking weight-sensitive stress. Finally, the study will also explore possible correlations between weight and syllable structure on a cross-linguistic basis in order to gain insight into the factors relevant for acquiring a stress system. This research investigates the relationship between the acoustics of speech and the perception of speech in the auditory system in order to contribute to our understanding of the sound systems of the world's languages. The result of this research will be a publicly available auditory model that will not only account for the phenomenon of weight-sensitive stress, the focus of the study, but will also provide insight into several other linguistic features, including sound inventories and syllable structure. Furthermore, investigation of the correlation between stress and syllable structure will potentially contribute to our understanding of how sound systems are acquired by children. Yet another benefit of the proposed study is that it broadens our knowledge of a number of understudied and endangered languages.