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The Effect of Pitch Span on Intonational Plateaux
Rachael-Anne KnightUniversity of Cambridge
Speech Prosody 2002
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What Are Intonational Plateaux?
The H of H*L nuclear accent has been observed to appear as a flat stretch of contour rather than as a single point
PlateauPeak
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How Are Plateaux Defined?
Plateaux are defined as being 4% down from any absolute peak in F0
4% is the range of perceptual equality
Peak
4% range
Plateau
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What Is Known About Plateaux – Segmental Factors
When the onset of the accented syllable is a sonorant, plateaux :
Are proportionally longer
Begin earlier inside the syllable
0 20 40 60 80 100
% syll
cl+
cl-
v+
v-
emp
nasal
approx
Ons
et t
ype
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What Is Known About Plateaux – Structural Factors
When there are more syllables in the foot
Both the beginning and end of the plateau are aligned later in the syllable 0 20 40 60 80 100
% syll
3
2
1
No
syll
s in
foot
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Summary of Factors Affecting Plateaux Realisation
Segmental Onset/coda type
Structural Number of syllables in the foot
? Extralinguistic Pitch span
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The Experiment - Aim
To look at the effect of pitch span on the plateau’s
Duration
Alignment
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What Is Pitch Span?
Pitch span is the difference between the highest and lowest targets in the utterance
The (extra) linguistic correlate is emotional involvement
Expanded Neutral Compressed
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How Does Peak Alignment Change With Pitch Span?
Peaks move later in the syllable when the pitch span is wider
This a feature when syllables are lengthened by non-structural means e.g. Slower tempo
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Duration Hypothesis
It is hypothesized that the plateau may be shorter in wider pitch spans
As the speaker has to reach more extreme values there may be less time to realise a plateau
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Alignment Hypothesis-A
If the duration hypothesis is correct the two ends of the plateau may contract around the peak in more expanded spans
This would lead to later alignment of the beginning and earlier alignment of the end of the plateau
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Alignment Hypothesis - B
Following data on peak alignment under changes in pitch span…
The whole plateau may be later in
expanded pitch spans
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Predicted Behaviour in Expanded Span
Duration Start Peak End
Hypothesis
A
Hypothesis
B
Results
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Stimuli
2 all-sonorant utterances We were relying on a milliner A milliner?!
In 3 pitch spans (compressed, neutral, expanded)
Recorded by one male and one female phonetician
Combined to form conversational dyads
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Procedure
Subjects listened to the stimuli through headphones in a sound-treated room
Instructed to produce an intonationally equivalent utterance in their own voice
Imitation recorded onto a UNIX machine using a high quality microphone
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Subjects
12 students at the University of Cambridge
8 women and 4 men
Age range 21-27
All with some phonetic training
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Pitch Span
Start of PlateauPeak
End of Plateau
PlateauDuration
Syllable Duration
Foot Duration
Low tone
Measurements Taken
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Statistics
Repeated measures (MANOVA)
Pitch span
Sex
Utterance
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Initial Results
The paradigm works – people really do use different pitch spans
As they imitate increasingly wider spans: The peak gets higher The distance between the high and low points
increases Syllables increase in duration
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Results – Duration of the Plateau
Plateau duration is significantly affected by pitch span
It is shorter in the expanded than the neutral span and shorter in the neutral than the compressed The duration
hypothesis is supported
0 20 40 60 80 100 120
ms
Com.
Neu.
Exp.
Pit
ch S
pan
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Results – Peak Alignment
Peak alignment is significantly affected by the pitch span
The peak is significantly later in the syllable in an expanded pitch span Confirming previous
studies
0 20 40 60 80 100
% syll
Com.
Neu.
Exp.
Pit
ch S
pan
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Results – Alignment of the Start of the Plateau
Alignment of the beginning of the plateau is affected by pitch span
It is later in the expanded span As predicted by both
alignment hypotheses
0 20 40 60 80 100
% syll
Com.
Neu.
Exp.
Pit
ch S
pan
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Results – Alignment of the End of the Plateau
The alignment of the end of the plateau is not significantly affected by the pitch span used It is consistently
anchored
This result was not predicted by either alignment hypothesis
0 20 40 60 80 100
% syll
Com.
Neu.
Exp.
Pit
ch S
pan
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Results – Alignment Summary
Start of plateau is later in expanded pitch span
Peak is later in expanded pitch span
End of plateau is stable across pitch span
0 20 40 60 80 100
% syll
Com.
Neu.
Exp.
Pit
ch S
pan
Start Peak End
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Observed Behaviour in Expanded Span
Duration Start Peak End
Hypothesis A
Hypothesis B
Results
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Conclusions
The duration hypothesis was confirmed
Neither alignment hypothesis was fully confirmed
Instead, surprisingly (?) the end of the plateau is consistently anchored
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Implication
I. Range of perceptual equality End of the plateau is first place at which the listener
can tell the speaker has started to fall
II. The end of the plateau covaries with foot structure
Later in the syllable in polysyllabic feet
The end of the plateau is an important marker of linguistic structure
Possibly more important than the peak itself
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The Effect of Pitch Span on Intonational Plateaux
Rachael-Anne Knight
University of Cambridge
Speech Prosody 2002