De rol van vocaalduur bij de categorisatie van onbeklemtoonde Nederlandse klinkers

Listeners are able to classify sounds into discrete categories. Th is phenomenon is called categorical perception. A variable that substantially inU+FB02uences perception is the linguistic background of the listener. For example, listeners can have diU+FB03 culties recognizing sounds from a language they are not familiar with. However, a factor that has not been studied in detail, is the inU+FB02uence of the regional background of listeners with the same mother tongue on the perception of speech sounds. This article addresses this question. Phonological descriptions of vowel systems often distinguish between U+2018tenseU+2019 and U+2018 laxU+2019 vowels. Both categories may diU+FB00er in pitch, intensity, vowel quality and duration. This article focuses on the role of vowel duration in the categorisation of unstressed vowels. The study is based on a corpus of spontaneously spoken Standard Dutch, produced by 80 Flemish and 80 Dutch teachers of Dutch. In a previous study Kloots et al. (2006) found that Flemish listeners categorized unstressed /a/U+2019s and /o/U+2019s quite consistently as U+2018 laxU+2019, whereas Dutch listeners clearly differentiated between U+2018tenseU+2019 and U+2018 laxU+2019 vowels. The present follow-up study shows that the U+2018tenseU+2019-U+2018 laxU+2019 distinction of the Dutch listeners goes hand in hand with a signiU+FB01cant diU+FB00erence in vowel duration: U+2018tenseU+2019 vowels have a longer duration than their U+2018 laxU+2019 counterparts. The mean duration of the vowels, categorized as U+2018tenseU+2019 and U+2018 laxU+2019 by the Flemish listeners was not signiU+FB01 cantly diU+FB00 erent. These U+FB01ndings conU+FB01rm our assumption that (only) for the Dutch listeners there is a real phoneme boundary between U+2018tenseU+2019 and U+2018 laxU+2019 unstressed vowels.

ISBN:9789038216577

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