Haskins Publications

Number	238
Year	1977
Drawer	4
Entry Date	06/03/1999
Authors	Lisker, L., Liberman, A. M., Erickson, D. M., Dechovitz, D., & Mandler, R.
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Publication	Language and Speech, 20, 209-216.
url	http://www.haskins.yale.edu/Reprints/HL0238.pdf
Abstract	There is much evidence that homorganic stop conss are distinguishable based on voice onset time (VOT) relative to their supraglottal articulation. For initial stops a convenient acoustic reference point is the onset of the release burst, & VOT has been defined as the interval between this point & onset of the glottal signal. VOT boundary values between English voiced & voiceless initial stops have been established through spectrographic measurement of naturally produced isolated words & by perception testing of synthesized cons-vowel syllables. The close match between the boundary values obtained in these two experiment types suggests that fairly natural values were chosen for the invariant features of the synthetic speech patterns tested. However, it is known that certain features affect voicing perception. New data from synthesis experiments suggest that VOT boundaries shift with changes in transition duration, & that the first formant rather than the higher ones is responsible. It has also been found that overall discrimination improves with longer transition duration. No indication was found of a limiting value of transition duration beyond which listeners might not perceive /ptk/.
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