Acoustic feature analysis in the perception of voicing contrasts

Abstract

Various types of acoustic cues have been shown to signal voicing contrasts in initial prestressed stop consonants. Two of the most important of these cues are the time interval between the release burst and the onset of voicing (voice onset time) and the duration of voiced transitions. In the present experiment, a selective adaptation procedure was used to investigate possible feature extraction mechanisms which underlie the perception of voicing. Subjects first identified either of two series of test stimuli, [ba-p ha) or [ga-k ha]. Next they listened to repeated presentations of an adapting stimulus and then again identified the original test series. Adapting stimuli having the same value of voice onset time but different voiced transition durations produced differential (and sometimes opposite) effects on the identification of the test stimuli. In every case, the adapting stimulus with the greater duration of voiced transitions led to larger reduction in voiced responses or to a smaller increase in voiceless responses. These results are incompatible with models of voicing perception based strictly on detectors for voice onset time. The results also suggest that the adaptation effect occurs at a point in the system prior to the actual phonetic decision. © 1977 Psychonomic Society, Inc.