Spectral and perceptual evidence for CV coarticulation in devoiced /si/ and /syu/ in Japanese.
We examined the spectral and perceptual characteristics of devoiced /si/ and /syu/ syllables in Japanese. Measurements showed that the deleted vowel can color the spectrum of the [integral of] in these syllables, although the mean influence is small. Perception tests showed that Japanese listeners can use this spectral coloring as a cue to the identity of the underlying vowel, although identification was substantially worse than in syllables where the /i/ or /u/ is maintained. These results suggest that a supposedly lower-level coarticulation between the fricative and the vowel can occur before a higher-level process deletes the vowel, contradicting the order implied by traditional accounts of speech as a translation of discrete phonological units.
D003463:Cues; D006801:Humans; D007564:Japan / Q000208:ethnology; D007802:Language; D010699:Phonation; D010700:Phonetics; D013018:Sound Spectrography; D013067:Speech Perception; D014481:United States