<OT> New Posting: ROA-684

[roa at ruccs.rutgers.edu]

ROA 684-0904

Learning to perceive a smaller L2 vowel inventory: an Optimality Theory account

Paul Boersma <paul.boersma at uva.nl>
Paola Escudero <paola.escudero at let.uu.nl>

Direct link: http://roa.rutgers.edu/view.php3?roa=684


Abstract:
This paper gives computer simulations of the perceptual
acquisition of the Spanish vowel system by Dutch learners
of Spanish, thereby faithfully modelling the results of
a listening experiment with real learners. Negatively formulated
constraints in the perception grammar help to map auditory
continua (first and second formant) to the 8 short Dutch
vowels and the 5 Spanish vowels (we also show that positively
formulated constraints do not work). These OT simulations
have the same categorization power as simple connectionist
models (Rosenblatt's perceptron) and the fuzzy logical model
of perception (Massaro). Unlike these other models, however,
OT perception models have the capacity to make a connection
to structural phenomena that phonologists are traditionally
interested in.

Comments: 
Keywords: acquisition, categorization, learning, perception, Spanish, Dutch, second language
Areas: Phonology,Phonetics,Learnability,Language Acquisition,Psycholinguistics
Type: Book Chapter

Direct link: http://roa.rutgers.edu/view.php3?roa=684