In this dissertation, I propose a model of the Lexicon in order to have a satisfactory account of interactions between morphology and phonology. The model is a modification of Lexical Prosodic Phonology introduced in Inkelas (1989). The main point of this study is that there are three types of morphological operations defined by the number of prosodic domains constructed corresponding to one morphological domain. (1) Three types of morphological operations: (a) One that constructs two new prosodic domains; (b) One that constructs one new prosodic domain; and (c) One that does not construct any new prosodic domain. The first two types are cyclic, while the third one is noncyclic. The three types of morphology are referred to as compounding, cyclic affixation, and noncyclic affixation, respectively. Interaction between morphology and phonology in Japanese verbs provides arguments for the three-way distinction of morphology. Some rules apply only in compounding; some other rules take effect only in cyclic affixation; some rules take effect in all three morphological processes. Nonapplication of rules is due to either their structural description or their nonstructural property. In the former case, the structural description of a cyclic rule is not satisfied because of prosodic representation. In the latter case, a cyclic rule does not apply, even if the structural description is satisfied, because the domain is noncyclic.

This work concerns how information structure is signalled prosodically in English, that is, how prosodic prominence and phrasing are used to indicate the salience and organisation of information in relation to a discourse model. It has been standardly held that information structure is primarily signalled by the distribution of pitch accents within syntax structure, as well as intonation event type. However, we argue that these claims underestimate the importance, and richness, of metrical prosodic structure and its role in signalling information structure. We advance a new theory, that information structure is a strong constraint on the mapping of words onto metrical prosodic structure. We show that focus (kontrast) aligns with nuclear prominence, while other accents are not usually directly 'meaningful'. Information units (theme/rheme) try to align with prosodic phrases. This mapping is probabilistic, so it is also influenced by lexical and syntactic effects, as well as rhythmical constraints and other features including emphasis. Rather than being directly signalled by the prosody, the likelihood of each information structure interpretation is mediated by all these properties. We demonstrate that this theory resolves problematic facts about accent distribution in earlier accounts and makes syntactic focus projection rules unnecessary. Previous theories have claimed that contrastive accents are marked by a categorically distinct accent type to other focal accents (e.g. L+H* v H*). We show this distinction in fact involves two separate semantic properties: contrastiveness and theme/rheme status. Contrastiveness is marked by increased prominence in general. Themes are distinguished from rhemes by relative prominence, i.e. the rheme kontrast aligns with nuclear prominence at the level of phrasing that includes both theme and rheme units. In a series of production and perception experiments, we directly test our theory against previous accounts, showing that the only consistent cue to the distinction between theme and rheme nuclear accents is relative pitch height. This height difference accords with our understanding of the marking of nuclear prominence: theme peaks are only lower than rheme peaks in rheme-theme order, consistent with post-nuclear lowering; in theme-rheme order, the last of equal peaks is perceived as nuclear. The rest of the thesis involves analysis of a portion of the Switchboard corpus which we have annotated with substantial new layers of semantic (kontrast) and prosodic features, which are described. This work is an essentially novel approach to testing discourse semantics theories in speech. Using multiple regression analysis, we demonstrate distributional properties of the corpus consistent with our claims. Plain and nuclear accents are best distinguished by phrasal features, showing the strong constraint of phrase structure on the perception of prominence. Nuclear accents can be reliably predicted by semantic/syntactic features, particularly kontrast, while other accents cannot. Plain accents can only be identified well by acoustic features, showing their appearance is linked to rhythmical and low-level semantic features. We further show that kontrast is not only more likely in nuclear position, but also if a word is more structurally or acoustically prominent than expected given its syntactic/information status properties. Consistent with our claim that nuclear accents are distinctive, we show that pre-, post- and nuclear accents have different acoustic profiles; and that the acoustic correlates of increased prominence vary by accent type, i.e. pre-nuclear or nuclear. Finally, we demonstrate the efficacy of our theory compared to previous accounts using examples from the corpus.

No description available.

This thesis tests the early incorporation of prosodic information during on-line processing of ambiguous word pairs such as Packing cases. The word pair is syntactically ambiguous between a noun or verb phrase interpretation. However, the two interpretations are prosodically distinct. An on-line, cross-modal, response-time task found that subjects disambiguated the word pairs using prosodic information. Experiment 2 swapped the timing,f_o and amplitude of the noun phrase versions with the verb phrase versions. If prosodic information were guiding parsing, swapping the prosody of the alternatives should change subjects' parses of the word-pairs. Subjects interpreted the cross-synthesised noun phrases as verb phrases and the crosssynthesised verb phrases as noun phrases. This provides additional evidence in favour of early prosodic processing. Experiment 3 tested whether subjects' ability to differentiate the two forms would be affected by flattening the f_o of the word pairs. Subjects' ability to disambiguate the word pairs was reduced by flattening the f_o of the stimuli. Again, this provides evidence in favour of f_o guiding parsing. Experiment 4 investigated the perceptual salience of prosodic information in the absence of lexical information, by testing parsing of delexicalised versions of the same wordpairs. Subjects continued to disambiguate the stimuli. This indicates that prosody can guide parsing even without lexical information. The results of the four experiments provide strong evidence in favour of the early incorporation of prosodic information in parsing: prosodic information can influence on-line parsing even in the presence of contradictory syntactic and spectral preferences; and in the absence of lexical information. This thesis concludes that the results of the experiments support strong interaction models of processing.

Thèse (M.Ling.) -- Université du Québec à Chicoutimi, programme extensionné de l'Université Laval, 2003. / Bibliogr.: f. [105]-127. Document électronique également accessible en format PDF. CaQCU

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 1998. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves [100]-111).

Thesis (M.S.)--State University of New York at Binghamton, Department of Psychology, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis--Stockholm. / Errata slip inserted. Includes bibliographical references (p. 104-109).

published_or_final_version / Linguistics / Master / Master of Philosophy

This dissertation studies the neural basis of song, a universal human behavior. The relationship of words and melodies in the perception of song at phonological, semantic, melodic, and rhythmic levels of processing was investigated using the fine temporal resolution of Electroencephalography (EEG). The observations reported here may shed light on a ubiquitous human experience and also inform the discussion of whether language and music share neural resources or recruit domain-specific neural mechanisms. Experiment 1 was designed to determine whether words and melody in song are processed interactively or independently. Participants listened to sung words in which the melodies and/or the words were similar or different, and performed a same/different task while attending to the linguistic and musical dimensions in separate blocks of trials. Event-Related Potentials and behavioral data converged in showing interactive processing between the linguistic and musical dimensions of sung words, regardless of the direction of attention. In particular, the N400 component, a well-established marker of semantic processing, was modulated by musical melody. The observation that variations in musical features affect lexico-semantic processing in sung language was a novel finding with implications for shared neural resources between language and music. Experiment 2 was designed to explore the idea that well-aligned text-settings, in which the strong syllables occur on strong beats, capture listeners' attention and help them understand song lyrics. EEG was recorded while participants listened to sung sentences whose linguistic stress patterns were well-aligned, misaligned, or had variable alignment with the musical meter, and performed a lexical decision task on subsequently presented visual targets. / Results showed that induced beta and evoked gamma power were modulated differently for well-aligned and misaligned syllables, and that task performance was adversely affected when visual targets followed misaligned and varied sentences. These findings suggest that alignment of linguistic stress and musical meter in song enhance beat tracking and linguistic segmentation by entraining periodic fluctuations in high frequency brain activity to the stimuli. A series of follow-up studies has been outlined to further investigate the relationship between rhythmic attending in speech and music, and the influence of metrical alignment in songs on childhood language acquisition. / by Reyna Leigh Gordon. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2010. / Includes bibliography. / Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2010. Mode of access: World Wide Web.