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Pronunciation difficulty, temporal regularity, and the speech-to-song illusion
Elizabeth H Margulis1, Rhimmon Simchy-Gross1, Justin L Black1
1Music Cognition Lab, University of Arkansas Fayetteville, AR, USA.
Frontiers in Psychology
|February 18, 2015
Summary
The speech-to-song illusion occurs regardless of repetition timing but is stronger for unfamiliar languages. Speech processing is more resistant to shifting perception toward song for easy-to-pronounce languages.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Science
- Neuroscience
- Psycholinguistics
Background:
- The speech-to-song illusion demonstrates how auditory perception can shift between speech and music.
- This phenomenon offers a unique window into comparative processing of language and music.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate how linguistic factors, specifically pronunciation difficulty, influence the speech-to-song illusion.
- To examine the role of temporal regularity in the speech-to-song illusion.
Main Methods:
- Participants rated spoken utterances (easy/difficult to pronounce languages) before and after repeated listening.
- Repetitions occurred at regular or irregular temporal intervals.
- The difference in ratings measured the strength of the speech-to-song illusion.
Main Results:
- The speech-to-song illusion was observed irrespective of temporal interval regularity.
- The illusion was stronger when utterances were from languages difficult for native English speakers to pronounce.
- Speech processing appeared more prone to adopting easy-to-pronounce languages into the illusion.
Conclusions:
- Pronunciation difficulty significantly modulates the speech-to-song illusion.
- Speech perception systems may be more resistant to classifying familiar, easy-to-pronounce speech as song.
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