The perception, representation, and use of non-native voicing cues

理解口语是一项艰巨的任务。方言和口音造成的差异使这项任务更加艰巨。有时，当一个人遇到一个有独特口音的人时，沟通会因为误解而中断。以单词“card”为例。听者可能会遇到这个词不熟悉的发音，听起来像其他单词：波兰语母语的人说的是“cart”，波士顿人说的是“cod”，西班牙语母语的人说的是“guard”。我们熟悉的“card”的发音和上面的变体之间的差别很小。但在语言中，最小的差异是两个词的区别，口语中的变化可以跨越词之间的感知界限。随着与说话者或口音的接触增加，误解就会减少，这大概是因为人们对讲话或口音有所了解。这个项目研究了这种知觉调整是如何发生的。为了学习一个单词的新变体，听众应该关注哪些信息？一个人是学习特定的声音，还是学习一般的口音？通过研究以英语为母语的人如何感知和识别非母语语言，可以更好地理解学习是如何发生的，哪些类型的信息在学习中是至关重要的，以及新的信息是如何在心理上表征的。特别地，听众如何学会使用新的或不熟悉的声音线索来解决潜在的误解的问题进行了调查，通过检查听众如何对不同的单词和单词对的反应，如上所示，随着时间的推移。例如，在实验开始时，受试者可能会将“cart”和“card”的非原生产物视为同一个单词（例如，“cart”）。但随着时间的推移，加上训练，听者可能会改变他或她的感知类别，开始把两个不同的词当作两个不同的词来听——正如说话者所希望的那样。在整个实验过程中，通过控制听者听到的是单个说话者、同一种语言的多个说话者，还是来自不同语言的多个说话者所呈现的单词，可以确定这种调整是针对一种声音、一种语言还是一个学习过程。

Understanding spoken language is a difficult task. Variation caused by dialects and accents make this task even more daunting. Sometimes when one meets a person with a distinctive accent, communication breaks down due to misunderstandings. Consider the word 'card'. A listener may encounter unfamiliar productions of this word that sound like other words: * 'cart' when produced by a native Polish speaker, * 'cod' when produced by a Bostonian, or * 'guard' when produced by a native Spanish speaker. The differences between the familiar pronunciation of 'card' and the variations above are minimal. But in language, minimal differences are what make two words distinct, and the variation in spoken words can cross the perceptual boundaries between words. As experience with a speaker or accent increases, there are fewer misunderstandings presumably because one learns something about the speech or the accent. This project investigates how this sort of perceptual adjustment takes place. What information do listeners focus on in order to learn a new variant of a word? Do one learn something about a specific voice, or about a general accent? By examining how native speakers of English perceive and recognize non-native speech, better understand how learning takes place can be achieved, what types of information are critical in learning, and how new information is mentally represented.Particularly, the problem of how listeners learn to use new or unfamiliar acoustic cues to resolve potential misunderstandings is investigated, by examining how listeners respond to different words and word pairs, as illustrated above, over time. For example, in the beginning of an experiment, a subject may treat non-native productions of 'cart' and 'card' as the same word (e.g., 'cart'). But over time, and with training, the subject may alter his or her perceptual categories and begin to hear the productions as two different words -- as intended by the speaker. By manipulating whether listeners hear the words presented by a single speaker, multiple speakers from a single language, or multiple speakers from different languages throughout the experiment it can be determined whether the adjustments are particular to one voice, one language, or one learning process.