Tonal coarticulation has been found in connected speech in many tonal languages. The current study investigated the carryover effect on tones of Hong Kong Cantonese (Cantonese), by examining F0 perturbation and preservation of two rising tones (T2 and T5) under the influence of a preceding tone (Tx). Twenty-two young adults were recruited to read a wordlist containing disyllabic words (Tx+T2/T5) and monosyllabic characters in six lexical tones. Onsets, offsets, and contours of T2 and T5 were measured and entered for statistical analyses. The carryover effect of high and low tones was found on T2 and T5. The coarticulation triggered by the low tone carries throughout the entire tonal contour while the coarticulation triggered by the high tone did not, as offsets of pitch contours of T2 and T5 preceded by a high tone reaches comparable levels of their own underlying pitch targets.
Cite as: Li, B., Guan, Y., Chen, S. (2020) Carryover Effects on Tones in Hong Kong Cantonese. Proc. Speech Prosody 2020, 489-493, doi: 10.21437/SpeechProsody.2020-100
@inproceedings{li20c_speechprosody,
author={Bin Li and Yihan Guan and Si Chen},
title={{Carryover Effects on Tones in Hong Kong Cantonese}},
year=2020,
booktitle={Proc. Speech Prosody 2020},
pages={489--493},
doi={10.21437/SpeechProsody.2020-100}
}