Oliver, N. (2008). Coding of intonational meanings beyond F0: Evidence from utterance-final /t/ aspiration in German. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 124(2), 1252–1263.
Presentation: Thomas
Summary: Hsiao-chien
This study investigates how aspiration could affect intonational meaning. In the first experiment, a trained male phonetician produced 24 short utterances with a terminal fall, of which the F0 peaked early, medial, or late. Results showed that aspiration noises following an early peak was significantly shorter, more intensive and had lower frequency values, compared with ones following a late peak. This was consistent with previous findings. The second experiment used perception to further examine the relationship between utterance-final aspiration and attitudinal meaning. Aspiration spectral energy, duration, and overall intensity were manipulated in the stimuli, and attitudinal meanings were gauged by Kohler’s (2005) scales. Results showed that the low, short, and loud configuration corresponded to the meaning of concluding, nonquestioning, certain, and accepting, compared to the high, long, and soft one. Combined with the first experiment, different utterance-final /t/ aspirations in naturally produced early and late peak contexts were able to signal attitudinal meanings. The study therefore indicated that the segmental and prosodic levels would be more intertwined.
