The Influence Of The Pitch Patterns In Chinese Irrelevant Speech On Serial Recall

The irrelevant speech effect is a phenomenon found in the serial recall process. Previous studies have proposed several theories about the irrelevant speech effect, but most adapted English language as irrelevant speech, and few has ever considered other languages. Mandarin, as a tonal language which is very different from English, has never been investigated so far as irrelevant speech effect is concerned.In this study, three experiments were conducted.In Experiment 1, tones were manipulated as a factor to observe the irrelevant speech effect when participants were doing digit serial recall. Results showed that the tones in Chinese speech can lead to the irrelevant speech effect. Different tones affect both the encoding and the rehearsal of the recall, but the unique tone only affects the rehearsal. In Experiment 2, emotional prosodies were manipulated. Results indicated that the emotional prosodies in Chinese can lead to the irrelevant speech effect. The different emotional prosodies in the irrelevant speech intervened both the encode and rehearsal of the memory items, but the unique emotional prosody in the irrelevant speech intervened only the encode of the memory items. In Experiment 3, participants were required to recall two types of words serially: concrete words and abstract words, while the irrelevant speech were the same in Experiment 1. Results revealed that there is no irrelevant speech effect when people recall the concrete words, which are easier to encode, but when the subjects recall the abstract words, the irrelevant speech effect appeared. It is of the same difficulty to rehearse the concrete words and the abstract words, so we could conclude that the difference came from the interference of the irrelevant speech on encoding. Therefore, the speculation that the irrelevant speech intervened the coding during the recall was validated.In summary, some of the results of current study were consistent with the Changing State Hypothesis, but further investigations need to be pursued, specifically in the area of cognitive loads, limitations of cognitive capacity, or the attractiveness of emotional prosody on attention resource.