Vowel-to-vowel coarticulation in English and Japanese

Abstract

Vowel-to-vowel coarticulation was investigated by analysis of formant trajectories in VCV utterances. Two sets of English utterances were analyzed, one with initial stress and one with final stress. The VCV utterances consisted of all combinations of the labial consonants /b/, /p/, and /m/ and the vowels /a/ and /i/. Preliminary acoustic analyses indicate: (i) There are substantial vowel-to-vowel coarticulatory effects in both English stress patterns not only in transitions but also in steady state portions, and (ii) Stressed vowels in English are more resistant to coarticulation than are unstressed vowels. The effects of transconsonantal vowel are present for the duration of an unstressed vowel, but are small or absent at the beginning of a stressed VC and the end of a stressed CV. A pilot study on Japanese VCV utterances with low pitch accent on initial and final vowels suggests that the magnitude of coarticulation is greater in Japanese than in English throughout the duration of the vowel. [Work supported by NICHD.]