INTERSPEECH 2011 12th Annual Conference of the International Speech Communication Association Florence, Italy August 27-31. 2011

Perceptual Sensitivity to Dialectal and Generational Variations in Vowels

Robert Allen Fox, Ewa Jacewicz

Ohio State University, USA

Perception of dialect variation is well studied with respect to perceptual similarity of talkers based on dialectal markers. This study examines the perceptual distinctiveness of regional vowel variants in light of cross-generational changes in vowel productions. Listeners from two regional dialects of English identified the dialect of the speaker in monosyllabic words (produced by older adults, young adults and children). Differential listener sensitivity to speaker dialect was found, which was highly affected by speaker generation. This suggests that the ability to determine dialect membership is an interaction between the perceptual spaces of listeners and the acoustic variations in vowels.

Full Paper

Bibliographic reference.  Fox, Robert Allen / Jacewicz, Ewa (2011): "Perceptual sensitivity to dialectal and generational variations in vowels", In INTERSPEECH-2011, 2921-2924.