Twenty-one normally developing 3-year-old children were tested on two approximate consonant contrasts, "rake-lake" and "wake-rake," and a control contrast, "wake-bake." The children showed very accurate perceptions of minimal pairs. Children who did not yet articulate "r" or "l" appropriately showed somewhat less consistent perception than…

Research supported by the Institute of Latin American Studies and the Canada Council. (DD)

A study of electromyographic (EMG) activity and palatal movement is reported. Motion pictures were taken of the nasal surface of the soft palate and EMG recordings from the levator palatini muscle were obtained. Both were analyzed for the relationship of velar height to EMG strength and time. (SC)

Reports on an experiment, conducted on ten children who misarticulated /s/, and designed to survey the effect of consonant context on misarticulation. Suggests that a context-sensitive model of phonetic performance is needed to account for variation in correct /s/ production. (Author/AM)

This test, conducted to prove that closed vowels can be heard in fricative utterances as open vowels in explosive utterances, gives further evidence for the closing action of constrictives and the opening action of occlusives. It also reveals a possible articulatory and auditive convergence between consonants and vowels. (Text is in French.)…

Two possible explanations based on elementary facts of physics are suggested for the universal preference for place of articulation of implosives and ejectives. Languages show a preference for ejectives in the order: velar, alveolar, and labial while implosives occur most often in the opposite order. A language will only have velar implosives if…

This paper examines the distinction between primary and secondary articulations of consonants. It shows that the description and classification of speech sounds should not be based on physical parameters alone. Some essential distinctions reveal themselves only inferentially through the relation of a sound to others in the language system.…

Revised version of a paper given at the 83rd Meeting of the Acoustical Society of American, April 18-21, 1972, Buffalo, New York; research supported by a grant from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. (DD)

Sentences were read by six informants to determine the presence or absence of /n/ in /nth/ sequences. The sentences contained seven different levels of juncture with /nth/ occurring in word final position, intervocalically, and across word boundaries, among other places. Dental coarticulation was not hindered by most junctures. (SC)

CERTAIN FEATURES IN THE MEXICAN PRONUNCIATION OF NASAL CONSONANTS ARE PRESENTED HERE AND LINGUISTIC GENERALIZATIONS ARE FORMULATED--FIRST IN TERMS OF A CURRENT THEORY OF UNIVERSAL PHONOLOGICAL DISTINCTIVE FEATURES, AND SECOND IN TERMS OF A REVISED DISTINCTIVE FEATURE FRAMEWORK INCORPORATING THE CHANGES PROPOSED BY CHOMSKY AND HALLE IN "THE SOUND…

Describes studies of voice onset time in Spanish and an acoustic feature termed presence versus absence of an abrupt consonant onset. It is suggested that this feature may be used by the Spanish listener in making a perceptual distinction between voiced and voiceless stop consonants in multiple environments. (Author/KM)

Explored the variation in the resistance that lingual and nonlingual consonants exhibit to coarticulation by following vowels in the schwa+CV disyllables of two native speakers of English. (Author/VWL)

A pneumotachographic investigation of intervocalic /p/, /t/ and /k/ was undertaken to isolate physiological parameters responsible for coarticulatory air-flow phenomena. Airflow was most sensitive during the /k/ closure phase. The dynamics of the closure phase for each place of articulation and their implications for pneumotachography are…