Phrase Lengths and the Perceived Informativeness of Prosodic Cues in Turkish

Area of Science:

• Psycholinguistics
• Computational Linguistics
• Phonetics

Background:

• Prosodic properties of speech often correlate with syntactic structure.
• Listeners can utilize prosodic cues to aid in speech comprehension.
• The Rational Speaker Hypothesis (RSH) suggests listeners assess the motivations behind prosodic breaks.

Purpose of the Study:

• To provide evidence for the Rational Speaker Hypothesis (RSH) in Turkish, a typologically distinct language.
• To investigate the RSH's effect on prosodic breaks that conflict with syntactic structure.
• To examine the interplay between prosody-based parsing (RSH) and syntax-sensitive parsing strategies.

Main Methods:

• Experimental study involving Turkish speakers.
• Analysis of prosodic boundary perception in relation to constituent length.
• Comparison of RSH effects on syntactically aligned versus conflicting prosodic breaks.

Main Results:

• Turkish data support the Rational Speaker Hypothesis (RSH), showing listeners find prosodic breaks more informative when flanking shorter constituents.
• The RSH was observed to reduce the perceived cue strength of prosodic breaks conflicting with syntax, a beneficial effect.
• Prosody-based parsing (RSH) and syntax-sensitive parsing (e.g., Late Closure) co-exist and are both utilized in speech processing.

Conclusions:

• The Rational Speaker Hypothesis (RSH) generalizes to Turkish, highlighting cross-linguistic relevance in prosody-syntax interactions.
• Listeners' interpretation of prosodic breaks is influenced by potential speaker motivations related to constituent length.
• Speech parsing involves a flexible integration of prosodic and syntactic information, rather than a single dominant strategy.