The Function Of Sound Quality In Chinese Mandarin Yin Ping - Yang Ping 's Perception

The present study focus on the perception of Yin Pin(tone 1) and Yang Pin(tone 2) in Chinese mandarin, based on the classical methods in psycholinguistics and take the paradigm of Categorical Perception(CP) as the principal approach. To reveal the effects of voice quality on CP, three factors(gender, phonation, vowels) are investigated. In each experiment, the effect of observed factor on the CP of tone is examined, while other factors are controlled.The paper has 6 chapters: Chapter 1 introduces backgrounds and previous works of current topic. Besides, the historical development and research paradigm of CP, the research methods of current study are also presented. Chapters 2 to Chapter 4 investigate the effects of gender, phonation and vowel on the CP of mandarin tone 1and tone 2. Several conclusions are made: 1, the effect of gender on CP relates to the pitch difference between male and female, and the perceptual boundary of male is more left than the female. 2, the level of pitch contour shows great influence on the perception of pitch variation. 3, the perceptual boundary in breathy voice is close to that in modal voice, yet the former shows weaker CP signs. 4, vowel effect exists — the perceptual boundary in vowel /a/、/i/、/u/ are different. 5, the discrimination boundary of randomized stimuli is more left to the ordered stimuli. Based on the results, Chapter 5 demonstrates the slop range of mandarin tone 1, which is found to be the same as in Zhuang and Dong languages. Summaries are made in Chapter 6, certain shortages of this study are also given.By taking in the theoretical frameworks and research methods of experimental phonetics and psycholinguistics, the present study examines the effect of voice quality(gender, phonation, and vowel) on the CP of tone 1- tone 2 in Chinese mandarin. Several findings are supported by the study, though, further investigations still need to be considered.