Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Home
Hostname: page-component-684899dbb8-bjz6k Total loading time: 0.305 Render date: 2022-05-22T09:03:53.459Z Has data issue: true Feature Flags: { "shouldUseShareProductTool": true, "shouldUseHypothesis": true, "isUnsiloEnabled": true, "useRatesEcommerce": false, "useNewApi": true }
  • English
Canadian Journal of Linguistics/Revue canadienne de linguistique Canadian Journal of Linguistics/Revue canadienne de linguistique

Article contents

Sonority projection effect in French: A signal detection theory approach

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 June 2021

Anahita Basirat ,
Cédric Patin  and
Jérémie Jozefowiez
Anahita Basirat*
Affiliation:
Université de Lille, CNRS, UMR 9193 - SCALab, France
Cédric Patin
Affiliation:
Université de Lille, CNRS, UMR 8163, STL, France
Jérémie Jozefowiez
Affiliation:
Université de Lille, CNRS, UMR 9193 - SCALab, France
*
anahita.basirat@univ-lille.fr
Get access Rights & Permissions[Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Focusing on the Sonority Sequencing Principle (SSP), we investigated the extent to which adult native speakers of French are sensitive to sonority-related constraints compared to lexical attestedness. In a non-word acceptability task, participants were asked to rate the acceptability of three types of non-words using a 6-point scale: non-words with attested sonority rising onset, non-words with unattested sonority rising onset, and non-words with unattested sonority falling onset. Data analysis was done using the signal detection theory approach to measure sensitivity of participants to lexical attestedness and to phonological well-formedness (i.e., respecting or violating the SSP). The results showed that speakers distinguished well-formed and ill-formed forms even when lexical attestedness was controlled for. This is consistent with previous findings on sonority projection effects. Participants were more sensitive to lexical attestedness than phonological well-formedness. Future research using computational models should investigate mechanisms that could account for these findings, namely whether a similar result would be obtained without including any assumption about the SSP in these models.

Keywords

Phonological constraintssonoritylexiconSignal Detection TheorySSP
Type
Squib/Notule
Information
Canadian Journal of Linguistics/Revue canadienne de linguistique , Volume 66 , Issue 2 , June 2021 , pp. 255 - 266
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Linguistic Association/Association canadienne de linguistique, 2021

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

We thank the participants in this study. We are grateful to Marine Guiborel, Roxane Kamphuis, Laurent Ott, and Laetitia Zmuda for their help in preparing the stimuli and/or collecting data.

References

Albright, Adam. 2009. Feature-based generalisation as a source of gradient acceptability. Phonology 26(1): 9–41. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0952675709001705CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bárkányi, Zsuzsanna. 2011. Gradient phonotactic acceptability a case study from Slovak. Acta Linguistica Hungarica 58(4): 353–390. https://doi.org/10.1556/aling.58.2011.4.1CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berent, Iris. 2017. On the origins of phonology. Current Directions in Psychological Science 26(2): 132–139. https://doi.org/10.1177/0963721416688891CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berent, Iris, and Lennertz, Tracy. 2010. Universal constraints on the sound structure of language: Phonological or acoustic? Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance 36(1): 212–223. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0017638Google ScholarPubMed
Berent, Iris, Steriade, Donca, Lennertz, Tracy, and Vaknin, Vered. 2007. What we know about what we have never heard: Evidence from perceptual illusions. Cognition 104(3): 591–630. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2006.05.015CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bucci, Jonathan, Lorusso, Paolo, Gerber, Silvain, Grimaldi, Mirko, and Schwartz, Jean-Luc. 2019. Assessing the representation of phonological rules by a production study of non-words in Coratino. Phonetica: 1–24. https://doi.org/10.1159/000504452Google ScholarPubMed
Clements, George N. 1990. The role of the sonority cycle in core syllabification. In Papers in laboratory phonology 1: Between the grammar and physics of speech, ed. Kingston, J. and Beckman, M., 283–333. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511627736.017CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Daland, Robert, Hayes, Bruce, White, James, Garellek, Mark, Davis, Andrea, and Norrmann, Ingrid. 2011. Explaining sonority projection effects. Phonology 28(2): 197–234. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0952675711000145CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Deschamps, Isabelle, Baum, Shari R., and Gracco, Vincent L.. 2015. Phonological processing in speech perception: What do sonority differences tell us? Brain and Language 149: 77–83. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bandl.2015.06.008CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Greenberg, Joseph H. 1978. Some generalizations concerning initial and final consonant clusters. In Universals in Human Language, vol. 2: Phonology, ed. Greenberg, J. H., Ferguson, C. A., and Moravscik, E. A., 243–279. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1515/ling.1965.3.18.5Google Scholar
Greenberg, Joseph H., and Jenkins, James J.. 1964. Studies in the psychological correlates of the sound system of American English. WORD 20(2): 157–177. https://doi.org/10.1080/00437956.1964.11659816CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hayes, Bruce 2011. Interpreting sonority-projection experiments: The role of phonotactic modeling. Proceedings of the International Congress of Phonetic Sciences, 835–838. Hong Kong: City University of Hong Kong.Google Scholar
Hayes, Bruce, and White, James. 2013. Phonological naturalness and phonotactic learning. Linguistic Inquiry 44(1): 45–75. https://doi.org/10.1162/LING_a_00119CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hayes, Bruce, and Wilson, Colin. 2008. A maximum entropy model of phonotactics and phonotactic learning. Linguistic Inquiry 39(3): 379–440. https://doi.org/10.1162/ling.2008.39.3.379CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Henke, Eric, Kaisse, Ellen, and Wright, Richard. 2012. Is the sonority sequencing principle an epiphenomenon? In The sonority controversy, ed. Parker, S., 65–100. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110261523.65Google Scholar
Huang, Yujing, and Ferreira, Fernanda. 2020. The application of signal detection theory to acceptability judgments. Frontiers in Psychology 11. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.00073Google ScholarPubMed
Jarosz, Gaja. 2017. Defying the stimulus: Acquisition of complex onsets in Polish. Phonology 34(2): 269–298. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0952675717000148CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jozefowiez, Jérémie, Gaudichon, Clément, Mekkass, Francis, and Machado, Armando. 2018. Log versus linear timing in human temporal bisection: A signal detection theory study. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Learning and Cognition 44(4): 396–408. https://doi.org/10.1037/xan0000184Google ScholarPubMed
Macmillan, Neil A., and Creelman, C. Douglas. 1991. Detection theory: A user's guide. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Macoir, Joël, Gauthier, Caroline, Jean, Catherine, and Potvin, Olivier. 2016. BECLA, a new assessment battery for acquired deficits of language: Normative data from Quebec-French healthy younger and older adults. Journal of the Neurological Sciences 361: 220–228. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jns.2016.01.004CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Maïonchi-Pino, Norbert, Taki, Yasuyuki, Magnan, Annie, Yokoyama, Satoru, Écalle, Jean, Takahashi, Kei, Hashizume, K. Hiroshi, and Kawashima, Ryuta. 2015. Sonority-related markedness drives the misperception of unattested onset clusters in French listeners. L'Année psychologique 115(2): 197–222. https://doi.org/10.4074/S0003503314000086CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Majerus, Steve, van der Kaa, M.-A., Renard, Cécile, Van der Linden, Martial, and Poncelet, Martine. 2005. Treating verbal short-term memory deficits by increasing the duration of temporary phonological representations: A case study. Brain and Language 95(1): 174–175. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bandl.2005.07.094CrossRefGoogle Scholar
New, Boris, Pallier, Christophe, Brysbaert, Marc, and Ferrand, Ludovic. 2004. Lexique 2: A new French lexical database. Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, & Computers 36(3): 516–524. https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03195598CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Parker, Steve. 2017. Sounding out sonority. Language and Linguistics Compass 11(9). https://doi.org/10.1111/lnc3.12248CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sato, Marc, Grabski, Krystyna, Glenberg, Arthur M., Brisebois, Amélie, Basirat, Anahita, Menard, Lucie, and Cattaneo, Luigi. 2011. Articulatory bias in speech categorization: Evidence from use-induced motor plasticity. Cortex 47(8): 1001–1003. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cortex.2011.03.009CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sievers, Eduard 1876. Grundzüge der lautphysiologie zur einführung in das studium der lautlehre der indogermanischen sprachen [Basics of phonetic physiology as an introduction to the study of phonetics in the Indo-European languages]. Leipzig: Breitkopf und Hartel.Google Scholar
Steriade, Donca 1990. Greek prosodies and the nature of syllabification. New York: Garland.Google Scholar
Ulbrich, Christiane, Alday, Phillip M., Knaus, Johannes, Orzechowska, Paula, and Wiese, Richard. 2016. The role of phonotactic principles in language processing. Language, Cognition and Neuroscience 31(5): 662–682. https://doi.org/10.1080/23273798.2015.1136427CrossRefGoogle Scholar
van de Vijver, Ruben, and Baer-Henney, Dinah. 2012. Sonority intuitions are provided by the lexicon. The sonority controversy, ed. Parker, S., 195–218. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.Google Scholar
White, James, and Chiu, Faith. 2017. Disentangling phonological well-formedness and attestedness: An ERP study of onset clusters in English. Acta Linguistica Academica 64(4): 513–537. https://doi.org/10.1556/2062.2017.64.4.2CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wiese, Richard, Orzechowska, Paula, Alday, Phillip M., and Ulbrich, Christiane. 2017. Structural principles or frequency of use? An ERP experiment on the learnability of consonant clusters. Frontiers in Psychology 7. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2016.02005CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

Save article to Kindle

To save this article to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Sonority projection effect in French: A signal detection theory approach
Available formats
×

Save article to Dropbox

To save this article to your Dropbox account, please select one or more formats and confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you used this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your Dropbox account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Sonority projection effect in French: A signal detection theory approach
Available formats
×

Save article to Google Drive

To save this article to your Google Drive account, please select one or more formats and confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you used this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your Google Drive account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Sonority projection effect in French: A signal detection theory approach
Available formats
×
×

Reply to: Submit a response

Please enter your response.

Your details

Please enter a valid email address.

Conflicting interests

Do you have any conflicting interests? *