How the demographic makeup of our community influences speech perception

Shiri Lev Ari, Sharon Peperkamp

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

23 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Speech perception is known to be influenced by listeners' expectations of the speaker. This paper tests whether the demographic makeup of individuals' communities can influence their perception of foreign sounds by influencing their expectations of the language. Using online experiments with participants from all across the U.S. and matched census data on the proportion of Spanish and other foreign language speakers in participants' communities, this paper shows that the demographic makeup of individuals' communities influences their expectations of foreign languages to have an alveolar trill versus a tap (Experiment 1), as well as their consequent perception of these sounds (Experiment 2). Thus, the paper shows that while individuals' expectations of foreign language to have a trill occasionally lead them to misperceive a tap in a foreign language as a trill, a higher proportion of non-trill language speakers in one's community decreases this likelihood. These results show that individuals' environment can influence their perception by shaping their linguistic expectations.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)3076-3087
Number of pages12
JournalJournal of the Acoustical Society of America
Volume139
Issue number6
Early online date6 Jun 2016
DOIs
Publication statusE-pub ahead of print - 6 Jun 2016

Cite this