Presentation: Shelly
Summary: Sarah
Final lengthening is pervasively found in the
literature of child-directed speech (CDS). However, it remains unclear whether
this effect is true, as most previous research lacks rigid stimulus controls. In
this regard, this study aims to examine the durational pattern of CDS in an
experimental setting, with different linguistic factors manipulated in the
stimuli. These include word position, focus, and sentence mode
(statement/question). Five theater students were recruited and instructed to
produce both CDS and adult-directed speech (ADS), according to given situations.
Before data analyses, all production was judged by another group of raters, to
make sure that the sentences measured were indeed perceived as CDS or ADS by
native listeners. Durational analyses indicated an effect of word position,
confirming the previous finding that the lengthening in CDS is the most
prominent in the last word of the sentence. The effect of final lengthening
disappeared, however, if word-to-sentence ratio was calculated. This implies
that the lengthening of CDS is not restricted to the last word; instead, it is
a global effect of the whole sentence. In addition, both focus position and
sentence modes significantly influenced the realizations of final words in CDS.
In particular, focus led to longer word duration, and the last word was longer
in CDS statements than in CDS questions. Taken together, these results suggest
that the prominent final lengthening in CDS is caused by an additive effect of
a number of linguistic factors.
