The perception of vowelless words in Tashlhiyt Berber

What is it about?

The perception of vowelless words in Tashlhiyt by native and naive (English) speakers, with particular interest for the sonority profile of the consonants

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Why is it important?

Vowels are important in speech perception as they provide acoustic cues to the listeners. The aim is to show that in the absence of vowels (like in many words in Tashlhiyt), the sonority profile of the consonants plays an important role in word perception. The study shows that rising-sonority clusters are better perceived than falling-sonority clusters and plateaus.

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