The Perception of Temporally Segmented Vowels and Consonant-Vowel Syllables

Abstract

The minimum initial-portion durations required by listeners for the correct identification of spoken isolated vowels and consonant-vowel (CV) syllables were determined. Eight vowels /i i u u æ ε a Λ/ and 64 CVs comprised of each of eight consonants /b p d t g k d₃ t∫/ in combination with each of the eight vowels were used. Segments consisted of the initial 10 to 150 milliseconds of each stimulus in 10-msec steps. The major findings were (1) clues for better than chance correct identification of tongue advancement and tongue height values for isolated vowels occur within the first 10 msec of the stimuli whereas approximately 30 msec of the stimuli are needed for the tense-lax feature to reach threshold, (2) clues for better than chance correct identification of place of articulation for the stop consonants are found within the initial 10 msec of the CVs whereas approximately 22 msec are needed for the voicing threshold to reach threshold, and (3) the threshold of voicing increases from front to back place of articulation for the stop consonants. The implications of the findings are discussed.