This dissertation explores the nature and ontogeny of infants' ability to match
phonetic information in comparison to non-speech information in the face and voice.
Previous research shows that infants' ability to match phonetic information in face and
voice is robust at 4.5 months of age (e.g., Kuhl & Meltzoff, 1982; 1984; 1988; Patterson &
Werker, 1999). These findings support claims that young infants can perceive structural
correspondences between audio and visual aspects of phonetic input and that speech is
represented amodally. It remains unclear, however, specifically what factors allow
speech to be perceived amodally and whether the intermodal perception of other
aspects of face and voice is like that of speech. Gender is another biologically significant
cue that is available in both the face and voice. In this dissertation, nine experiments
examine infants' ability to match phonetic and gender information with dynamic faces
and voices.
Infants were seated in front of two side-by-side video monitors which displayed
filmed images of a female or male face, each articulating a vowel sound ( / a / or / i / ) in
synchrony. The sound was played through a central speaker and corresponded with
one of the displays but was synchronous with both. In Experiment 1,4.5-month-old
infants did not look preferentially at the face that matched the gender of the heard voice
when presented with the same stimuli that produced a robust phonetic matching effect.
In Experiments 2 through 4, vowel and gender information were placed in conflict to
determine the relative contribution of each in infants' ability to match bimodal
information in the face and voice. The age at which infants do match gender
information with my stimuli was determined in Experiments 5 and 6. In order to
explore whether matching phonetic information in face and voice is based on featural or
configural information, two experiments examined infants' ability to match phonetic
information using inverted faces (Experiment 7) and upright faces with inverted
mouths (Experiment 8). Finally, Experiment 9 extended the phonetic matching effect to
2-month-old infants. The experiments in this dissertation provide evidence that, at 4.5
months of age, infants are more likely to attend to phonetic information in the face and
voice than to gender information. Phonetic information may have a special salience
and/or unity that is not apparent in similar but non-phonetic events. The findings are
discussed in relation to key theories of perceptual development. / Arts, Faculty of / Psychology, Department of / Graduate
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UBC/oai:circle.library.ubc.ca:2429/13476 |
| Date | 11 1900 |
| Creators | Patterson, Michelle Louise |
| Source Sets | University of British Columbia |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, Thesis/Dissertation |
| Format | 6755893 bytes, application/pdf |
| Rights | For non-commercial purposes only, such as research, private study and education. Additional conditions apply, see Terms of Use https://open.library.ubc.ca/terms_of_use. |
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