A cross-language study of the perception of nasal vowels

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Abstract
Nasalization of vowels introduces one or more additional resonances in the vicinity of the first formant (F1), and often a shift of F1. The perceptual effect of these types of spectral changes has been studied for five vowels, [i e ɑ o u], synthesized in the context [tV]. Identification and discrimination functions were obtained for syllables forming an acoustic continuum from a non-nasal to a nasal vowel. Identification functions showed rather abrupt shifts from non-nasal to nasal judgments, and discrimination functions tended to peak near the boundaries. These effects were less marked for speakers of English than for speakers of certain Indian languages containing the nasal-non-nasal opposition. We have attempted to specify some common acoustic correlate of the feature nasal, associated with a reduction in prominence of the F1 spectral peak, that would account for this shift in perception. Proposals are made for describing how the auditory system responds to different degrees of low-frequency prominence, either through spectral or temporal characteristics of peripheral auditory processing. [Supported by a grant from NINCDS.]

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