Onset-rime coarticulation in the production of /dai/ and /stai/ by four year old Scottish English speaking children: preliminary results.
Citation
Scobbie, J. (2000) Onset-rime coarticulation in the production of /dai/ and /stai/ by four year old Scottish English speaking children: preliminary results., Les Cahiers de l'ICP, Bulletin de la Communication Parl̩e., , , pp. 131-141,
Abstract
Patterns of coarticulation between onset and rime in the speech of six Scottish English speaking
children aged 4 years is examined in the words dye /dai/ and sty /stai/. F2 is 272Hz lower at the
burst following /st/ than following /d/. The lower F2 after /st/ in the onset-rime transition is
accompanied by a higher F2 during /ai/'s diphthongal offglide. Moreover, the overall shapes of the
F2 trajectories are similar, and the frequency difference in F2 at the stop burst correlates with
difference in duration between complex and singleton onset. These facts suggest that in the /st/-
initial word the diphthong is apparently initiated earlier with respect to the stop burst - and
therefore that the intial portion of the vowel opening gesture is masked acoustically by the
preceding stop to a greater extent after the cluster than after the singleton. This interpretation
supports models of intergestural timing in which hierarchical prosodic nodes (in this case, the
onset) enable non-local gestural organisations. The syllable onset provides a fixed anchoring point
for the following vowel (a C-centre) which results in greater acoustic masking when the onset is
complex.