30.3493, Diss: Phonology: Sayako Uehara: '' Word Segmentation for Japanese and English Speakers: Language-Independent and Language-Dependent Cues''

[The LINGUIST List]

LINGUIST List: Vol-30-3493. Wed Sep 18 2019. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 30.3493, Diss:  Phonology: Sayako Uehara: '' Word Segmentation for Japanese and English Speakers: Language-Independent and Language-Dependent Cues''

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Date: Wed, 18 Sep 2019 11:46:17
From: Sayako Uehara [suehara at nd.edu]
Subject: Word Segmentation for Japanese and English Speakers: Language-Independent and Language-Dependent Cues

 
Institution: Michigan State University 
Program: Linguistics 
Dissertation Status: Completed 
Degree Date: 2019 

Author: Sayako Uehara

Dissertation Title: Word Segmentation for Japanese and English Speakers:
Language-Independent and Language-Dependent Cues 

Linguistic Field(s): Phonology


Dissertation Director(s):
Yen-Hwei Lin
Karthik Durvasula

Dissertation Abstract:

Phonotactic knowledge and experience-independent knowledge have both been
argued to cue word segmentation in prior studies (e.g. Ettlinger, Finn, &
Hudson Kam, 2011; McQueen, 1998). This dissertation attempts to compare the
effect of two types of cues, language-independent and language-dependent
knowledge, on word segmentation. The specific cues selected for each type were
the Sonority Sequencing Principle (SSP) as a language-independent cue and
geminates (double consonants) as a language-dependent cue. The effectiveness
of the cues was determined by two groups of speakers with different language
background, native Japanese and native American English speakers. The two
languages were chosen particularly because they contrast in two aspects
relevant to these specific cues: (1) Japanese has a simple syllable structure,
no consonant clusters (except for consonant-glide sequences), while English
has an extensive set of bi-consonantal clusters and limited tri-consonantal
clusters. (2) Japanese has a phonemic consonant length contrast (singletons
vs. geminates), while English lacks such a contrast. Details of (1) are
relevant for testing the SSP, and those of (2) for testing geminates as a cue
to word segmentation.

The results from three artificial language learning experiments consistently
indicate, contrary to prior claims, that the (language-independent) SSP is not
a reliable cue to segment speech strings for either language groups,
regardless of the difference in syllable structure. On the other hand,
knowledge about language-dependent geminates seems to be a good 
predictor as to how speakers segment words from a string with word-internal
geminates. Japanese speakers, whose language has a phonemic contrast between
geminates and singleton consonants, consistently segmented the speech string
so that geminates were retained within words, whereas English speakers without
such a contrast in their native language tended to break up the string at
geminates. Moreover, the results indicate that listeners are able to rely
heavily on the transitional probability (TP) of the syllables to segment the
string, primarily when the structure of the stimulus words in the target
speech string is simple.

>From the results of this study, language-dependent knowledge seems to be more
effective than language-independent knowledge in word segmentation.




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