The Relationship between Non-Native Perception and Phonological Patterning of Implosive Consonants.

Area of Science:

• Phonetics and Phonology
• Psychoacoustics
• Cross-linguistic Perception

Background:

• Phonetic similarity often predicts phonological patterning.
• The relationship between phonological patterning and perceptual similarity is not fully understood.
• Non-native consonant perception offers insight into these relationships.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate whether phonologically patterned segments are perceived as similar.
• To examine how native language (L1) influences perception of non-native implosive consonants.
• To compare perception of implosives, plosives, and sonorants by English and Guébie listeners.

Main Methods:

• Two perception experiments were conducted.
• Listeners with different L1 backgrounds (English, Guébie) categorized non-native implosive consonants.
• Implosives were compared perceptually with plosives and sonorants.

Main Results:

• English listeners made more errors distinguishing implosives from voiced plosives than Guébie listeners.
• Both groups perceived implosives as more similar to voiced plosives than sonorants.
• Guébie listeners showed better categorization of non-native alveolar implosives.

Conclusions:

• Perceptual similarity hierarchies for implosives exist and are influenced by L1 phonological patterns.
• Listeners can extend L1 features to perceive non-native sounds.
• Phonological patterning does not solely determine perceptual similarity.