Experimental Studies on Intonation: Phonetic, Phonological and Psycholinguistic

1. Experimental Studies on Intonation: Phonetic, Phonological and Psycholinguistic Aspects of Sentence Prosody, 5-7 January 2009, Potsdam University Carlos Gussenhoven On the phonological status of pitch falls in English and Dutch: Evidence from semantic judgements Queen Mary, University of London

2. Outline Two analyses of pre-nuclear steep falls in English: 1. a falling pitch accent (Palmer, Halliday, Crystal, O’Connor & Arnold, Gussenhoven, Ladd, Féry, Grabe, Peters, ToDI ...) 2. an interpolation between a high accent and a following boundary L (Bolinger, Pierrehumbert, MAE-ToBI, GToBI) Experiment I (Sentence adverbs): The steep fall in ‘Jackknife’ does not define a boundary, unlike the steep fall before low plateau. Experiment II (Tone Concord): ditto, plus: the rise of the peak is the interpolation, the fall is the pitch accent

3. Semantic consensus I don’t think she meant to say that ADDITION, PROCLAIMING, NEUTRAL, STATEMENT, NEW, ..

4. Phonological consensus I don’t think she meant to say that

5. Some analyses • Each tone is a morpheme (almost: Hirschberg & Pierrehumbert 1990); find no semantic evidence for tone grouping. • L+H*: phonological grouping (MAE-ToBI, GToBI): on-ramp. • H*L: morphological grouping (’British’, ToDI): off-ramp teaspoon: Morphology: [ti:] [spu:n] *[ti:s] [ pu:n] Phonology: /t/ /i:/ /s/ /p/ /u:/ /n/ Diphthongs: /Ii,Uu/; syllables: ?(ti:(s)pu:n) ?(ti:)(spu:n)

6. Semantic consensus Are you really considering that option? TESTING, REFERRAL, NOT NEW, INTERROGATIVE, ..

7. Phonological consensus Are you really considering that option?

8. The Great Divide British/European: Off-ramp American: On-ramp Crystal, Halliday, ToDI, Féry, Bolinger, Pierrehumbert, Grabe, Peters MAE-ToBI

9. MAE-ToBI vs ToDI L+H* L- L% L* H- H% MAE-ToBI

10. MAE-ToBI vs ToDI %L H*L L% %L L*H H% ToDI

11. Some consequences of LH vs HL 1 On-ramp implies one more right-hand boundary than off-ramp: predictions of boundaries. 2 On-ramp implies first half defines identity, off-ramp implies second half defines identity.

12. ToDI Main features of ToDI • DISPLACEMENT: Trailing tone of pre-nuclear pitch accents is pronounced rightmost (1984: Partial tone-linking, also: right-alignment) • CONTINUATION: Morpheme-final tones continue targets (until next morpheme or end of phrase is encountered) (‘double alignment’, 2000, 2004, 2005) • Pre-nuclear H*LH (cf. O’Connor & Arnold’s Jackknife, 1984)

13. ToDI Main features of ToDI • H*, L* H*L, L*H; prenuclear H*LH(; nuclear H*H) • %L,%H • L%,H%, % • (DOWNSTEP-morpheme) • (L*-prefixation) • (H-prefixation)

14. ToDI • and we then kept ALL the bottles that had a dePOSit on them CONTINUATION CONTINUATION DISPLACEMENT %L H*L H*L L%

15. ToDI • and we then kept ALL the bottles that had a dePOSit on them CONTINUATION CONTINUATION DISPLACEMENT %L H*LH H*L L%

16. ToDI CONTINUATION • and did you keep ALL the bottles that had a dePOSit on them CONTINUATION CONTINUATION %L H* L*H H%

17. ToDI • and did you keep ALL the bottles that had a dePOSit on them %L H*L L*H H%

18. ToDI • and we then kept all the bottles that had a dePOSit on them CONTINUATION CONTINUATION %L H* %

19. %L H*LH% %L H*L L% %L H*LH H*L L% ToDI’s tritonal prenuclear H*LH maar kep NIET gezegd dat we niet toe moeten naar herverdeling van ARbeid‘But I haven’t said we shouldn’t consider redistribution of labour’(Neelie Smit-Kroes) %L H*L H*L L%

20. Experiment I: English Research question Does a steep F0 fall from an accented syllable signal an IP-boundary? Methodology Semantic judgements about F0 contours on two-accent source utterances that are disambiguated by an IP-boundary

21. Experiment I: English Verbal adverb vs. sentence adverb She TREATED the poor man(,) HONESTLY I THOUGHT she responded(,) ODDLY He NEVER acted(,) STRANGELY He DEALT with the woman(,) HONESTLY

22. Experiment I: English f0 manipulation on durationally hybridized source utterances by female AmE speaker - Three pitch accents H*L, H*LH and H* (all before H*L L%) - Boundary vs No boundary - %L and %H - Female speaker read eight sentences (two sets of four) - Durational hybrids were created by judicious splicing and cutting of sections in the speech wave form, per segment. - Two sentences used the ‘comma’ source utterances, two the ‘no comma’ source utterances - 12 F0 contours on each hybridized speech files (i.e. only f0 varied)

23. Experiment I: English 2 x 6 contours %L %H %H%L H*L (L% %L) H*L L% %H%L H*LH (% %L) H*L L% %H%L *H ( % %L) H*L L%

24. Experiment I: English %H%L H*L L% %L H*L L% %H%L H*L H*L L% %H%L H*L H% %L H*L L% %H%L H*LH H*L L% %H%L *H % %L H*L L% %H%L *H H*L L%

25. Experiment I: English Task - Pairs of contours: which is more likely to have the comma? (‘1, 2 or neither’); ditto ‘lack’ - %L and %H sets of 5 x 6 contour pairs - Sentences and contours Latin-squared - 15 American English subjects (12 vs 3 per order)

26. Experiment I: English Your task in this 10-minute experiment is to listen to a number of pairs of sentences and to decide which of the two pronunciations expresses better that there is coherence between the verb and adverb. You do that by checking either the first or the third box. In the following example, the listener judged that the second pronunciation of the sentence more clearly expresses that there is coherence between the verb and the adverb, i.e. that the treatment of his case was honest: She dealt with him honestly In the next example, the listener thought that her treatment was honest: 1 She dealt with him honestly You are always encouraged to make a decision. You will find that ... She dealt with him honestly 1 0 2 1 0 2 1 0 2

27. Experiment I: English Your task in this 10-minute test experiment is to listen to a number of pairs of sentences and to decide which of the two pronunciations expresses the ‘comma intonation’ better. You do that by checking either the first or the third box. In the following example, the listener judged that the second pronunciation of the sentence more clearly expressed the comma than the first: She dealt with him, honestly In the next example, the listener thought that the first better expressed the comma: She dealt with him, honestly You are always encouraged to make a decision. You will find that often ... She dealt with him, honestly 1 0 2 1 0 2 1 0 2

28. Experiment I: English

29. Experiment I: English

30. Experiment I: English Conclusions 1. Steep fall followed by rise (the ‘Jackknife’ of O’Connor & Arnold) does not define a boundary; 2. Off-ramp analyses (British, ToDI) are supported if H*LH is accepted. A rival analysis is L+H*+L followed by H+H*. Neither of these are available in MAE-ToBI. And something needs to be done such that H+H* and H+L* always appear after L+H*+L .

31. Experiment II: Dutch Tone Concord Pitch accents (e.g. Wells 2006, Intonation) - Identical melodic structure - separated by an IP-boundary

32. Experiment II: Dutch Tone Concord • - Apposition • Mr. Evans, the butcher (cf. John the Baptist) • - Reformulation • They had about ten, about a dozen • - Optional adverbial • Act normally, like William • - Non-restrictive relative clauses • He chose to keep the watch, which was never repaired • - ...

33. Experiment II: Dutch Tone Concord • - Restrictive apposition • Mr. Evans, the butcher (cf. John the Baptist) • - Reformulation • They had about a dozen, more than ten • - Optional adverbial vs. modal adverb • ‘Act normally, like William’ • - Non-restrictive relative clauses • He chose to keep the watch, which was never • repaired Doe gewoon, zoals Willem ‘Act normally, like William’ vs Doe gewoon zoals Willem ‘Just act like William’

34. Experiment II: Dutch Two hypotheses 1 No boundary after prenuclear H*LH (like English experiment) 2 The off ramp (=the fall from the peak) represents the pitch accent (and not the on-ramp=the rise to the peak)

35. Experiment II: Dutch Two hypotheses 1 No boundary after prenuclear H*LH (like English experiment) 2 The off ramp (=the fall from the peak) represents the pitch accent (and not the on-ramp=the rise to the peak) Semantic difference due to ±bounday (identical melodies) Semantic difference due to variation in shape of pre-nuclear pitch accent (+boundary)

36. Experiment II: Dutch Identification experiment Semantic task: meaning modal adverb or otherwise? Female speaker 3 ambiguous words 2 two sentence lengths 6 contours (Praat, f0 manipulation) 5-point scale Two counterbalanced orders, reversed scales 5 filler contours 20 listeners

37. Experiment II: Dutch repeated stimulus presentation zonder anderen in ’t café [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] slechts in ’t café doe normaal, zoals Willem [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] doe maar net als Willem in een file op de snelweg [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] zeker op de snelweg

38. Experiment II: Dutch %L H*L L% %L H*L L% %L H*L H% %L H*L H% %L L*H % %L L*H H%

39. 290 270 %L H*L L% %L H*L L% %L H*L H% %L H*L H% %L L*H % %L L*H H% 210 180 160 160 180 240 250 200 280 240 240 160 165

40. 290 270 %L H*L H*L L% %L H*LH H*L H% %L L*H L*H H% 210 180 190 160 180 250 175 280 240 240 160 165

41. Experiment II: Dutch No boundary -> Modal meaningBoundary -> Concord

42. Hypothesis

43. ‘She’s surely there?’ is semantically incongruous

44. Experiment II: Dutch Identity of pitch accent %L H*L % %L H*L L% % L+H* L- % L+H* L- L%

45. Experiment II: Dutch On-ramp (ToBI) vs Off-ramp (ToDI) %H H*L % %L H*L L% %H H* L- L% % L+H* L- L% %L H* % %L H*L L% % L+H* L- L% % L+H* L- L% %L H*L % %L H*L L% % L+H* L- L% % L+H* L- L%

46. hij zit alleen in het café hij zit alleen met die man in het café %H H*L % %L H*L L% %L H* % %L H*L L% %L H*L % %L H*L L%

47. Experiment II: Dutch Non-identity -> Modal meaningIdentity -> Concord

48. Experiment II: Dutch Hypothesis

49. Experiment II: Dutch ??He is aLONE with that man in the PUB ‘alone’ has shifted to ‘only’

50. Experiment II: Dutch Conclusions • Pre-nuclear H*LH exists (Jackknife has no boundary after first peak) • An accentual peak is a fall, not a rise. • Listeners respond sensibly to meaning identification task.