The results reported in this paper indicate that native speakers of Mandarin Chinese rate the
perceptual similarities among the lexical tones of Mandarin differently than do native …

This dissertation investigates the differential substitution of interdental fricatives ([&thetas;,
ð]) by learners of English as a second language. Differential substitution (or transfer) occurs …

Local assimilation is a phonological alternation in which two sounds that are adjacent
become more similar. Its opposite is dissimilation, an alternation in which two sounds that …

This chapter provides an overview of how experimental work has informed phonological
theories, and vice versa. This chapter starts with a historical overview; when phonology was …

The task of speech perception involves converting a continuous, information-rich waveform
into a more abstract representation. This mapping process is heavily language-dependent …

Much debate in recent years has focused on the relative contribution of analytic and channel
biases in shaping the typology of sound. Moreton (2008) argues forcefully for the strength of …

Steriade (2008) argues that faithfulness constraints in Optimality Theory are perceptually
grounded: the faithfulness of a phonological mapping is directly proportional to the …

Phonology describes spoken language as a combinatorial system typically comprising 30–
40 basic units. The smallest known inventories make use of about 10 contrastive units, the …

The notions of mergers and neutralization presuppose the concept of contrast. Two sounds
are phonologically contrastive if they are in opposition with each other, ie if they are capable …

Features serve two main functions in the phonology of languages: they encode the
distinction between pairs of contrastive phonemes (distinctive function); and they delimit sets …