The effect of language experience on perceptual normalization of Mandarin tones and non-speech pitch contours

Abstract

Context-dependent pitch perception helps listeners recognize tones produced by speakers with different fundamental frequencies (f0s). The role of language experience in tone normalization remains unclear. In this cross-language study of tone normalization, native Mandarin and English listeners were asked to recognize Mandarin Tone 1 (high-flat) and Tone 2 (mid-rising) with a preceding Mandarin sentence. To further test whether context-dependent pitch perception is speech-specific or domain-general, both language groups were asked to identify non-speech flat and rising pitch contours with a preceding non-speech flat pitch contour. Results showed that both Mandarin and English listeners made more rising responses with non-speech than with speech stimuli, due to differences in spectral complexity and listening task between the two stimulus types. English listeners made more rising responses than Mandarin listeners with both speech and non-speech stimuli. Contrastive context effects (more rising responses in the high-f0 context than in the low-f0 context) were found with both speech and non-speech stimuli for Mandarin listeners, but not for English listeners. English listeners' lack of tone experience may have caused more rising responses and limited use of context f0 cues. These results suggest that context-dependent pitch perception in tone normalization is domain-general, but influenced by long-term language experience.

The effect of context duration on Mandarin listeners' tone normalization

“…To more precisely locate the critical context duration for Mandarin tone normalization, more context durations around 250 ms should be tested, while the 1000 -and 1500-ms context durations may not be necessary in future studies. Consistent with previous studies of Mandarin tone normalization (e.g., Huang and Holt, 2009;Luo and Ashmore, 2014), this study again showed that Mandarin listeners made use of both intrinsic and extrinsic pitch cues to recognize Mandarin contour tones. The contrastive effect of context F0 on the recognition of target Tone 1-Tone 2 series was stronger in this study than in Huang and Holt (2009) and Luo and Ashmore (2014).…”

“…It is possible that the context effect on tone recognition may saturate when the context is longer than a critical duration. In Luo and Ashmore (2014), context effects on Mandarin tone recognition were actually similar for both the 500-ms non-speech contexts and 1319-ms speech contexts with the same mean F0s. Eramela (2002) tested Cantonese level tone normalization with contexts of different durations, each containing a different number of syllables with the same mid-level tone.…”

“…The target Tone 1-Tone 2 (high-flat and mid-rising) series were the same as those in Luo and Ashmore (2014). A male native Mandarin speaker produced a Mandarin syllable /i/ in Tone 1.…”

“…A semantically neutral sentence "请听下个词" /qing3 ting1 xia4 ge4 ci2/, meaning "please listen to the next word," was also recorded from the male speaker. Instead of using the whole sentence as in Luo and Ashmore (2014), this study used the first two words of the sentence (i.e., "请听" /qing3 ting1/, meaning "please listen") to create the different preceding contexts. Compared to the 1319-ms sentence, the 517-ms two-word phrase was more suitable for creating the different preceding contexts, because its duration was in the middle of the five tested context durations (i.e., 125, 250, 500, 1000, and 1500 ms).…”

“…context and target stimuli, as long as listeners have the linguistic experience of Mandarin tones (e.g., Luo and Ashmore, 2014).…”