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Learnability of prosodic boundaries: Is infant-directed speech easier?
Bogdan Ludusan1, Alejandrina Cristia1, Andrew Martin2
1Laboratoire de Sciences Cognitives et Psycholinguistique, EHESS/École Normale Supérieure-PSL Research University/CNRS, Paris, France.
The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America
|September 3, 2016
Summary
Infant-directed speech (IDS) uses enhanced acoustic cues like pause and nucleus duration to signal prosodic boundaries, aiding language acquisition. These boundaries are more easily learned in IDS compared to adult-directed speech (ADS).
Area of Science:
- Linguistics
- Developmental Psychology
- Speech Science
Background:
- The hypothesis that acoustic cues in infant-directed speech (IDS) aid prosodic boundary learning is long-standing.
- Previous research on prosodic boundary cues in IDS versus adult-directed speech (ADS) shows inconsistent findings.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate whether acoustic cues to prosodic boundaries are easier to learn in IDS than in ADS.
- To examine the specific roles of pause duration, nucleus duration, and pitch change in this phenomenon.
Main Methods:
- Systematic literature review.
- Statistical analysis of a Japanese speech corpus (mother-child and mother-interviewer interactions).
- Supervised and unsupervised machine learning experiments on acoustic cues.
Main Results:
- Pause duration and nucleus duration are enhanced in IDS.
- Pitch change (f0) is degraded in IDS.
- Machine learning models consistently classified IDS boundaries more accurately than ADS boundaries.
Conclusions:
- Enhanced pause and nucleus durations in IDS facilitate prosodic boundary learning.
- Findings support the hypothesis that IDS aids early linguistic structure acquisition.
- The study highlights the importance of specific acoustic cues in infant language development.
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