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Perceptual Structure of 12 American English Vowels

1971; Acoustical Society of America; Volume: 49; Issue: 6B Linguagem: Inglês

10.1121/1.1912592

1520-9024

Sadanand Singh, David Woods,

Phonetics and Phonology Research

Numerical ratings of dissimilarity among 12 American English vowels were analyzed by means of the Shepard-Kruskal procedure for nonmetric multidimensional scaling. The computer output was a geometric configuration of points representing the vowels whose interpoint distances related (approximately) monotonically to the dissimilarities data—the greater the judged dissimilarity between a pair of vowels, the greater the distance between the associated points. Using a procedure developed by Schönemann and Carroll, the axes from the MD-SCAL analysis were rotated, translated, and dilated to match a target “configuration” based on certain phonetic features. The dimensions from a three-dimensional analysis were interpreted as “tongue height,” “tongue advancement,” and “retroflexion” (multiple R = 0.70). When the vowel /ɜ/ was eliminated from the analysis, however, only the first two of these dimensions were needed (multiple R = 0.73).