On the perceptual basis of distinctive features: Evidence from the perception of fricatives by Dutch and English speakers

Two speech perception experiments explored the auditory basis of distinctive features. Experiment 1 found that Dutch listeners rated [s] and [ʃ] as more similar to each other than American English listeners did. We attributed this to the lack of a phonemic distinction between [s] and [ʃ] in Dutch phonology in addition to their relationship via a productive phonological rule in Dutch. Experiment 1 also found that Dutch listeners rated [θ] and [s], and [θ] and [ʃ] as more similar to each other than did American English listeners. We attributed this to the lack of [θ] in the Dutch inventory. Experiment 2 found that Dutch and American English listeners did not significantly differ from each other in a speeded discrimination task with the same stimuli as Experiment 1. Reaction times in Experiment 2 were highly correlated with the rating data of Experiment 1 indicating that the general pattern of response in Experiment 1 was based on auditory similarity, with language-specific effects superimposed on the general pattern. The auditory basis of distinctive features found here accords with Stevens’ (1989) quantal theory account of the feature [±anterior]. We conclude that phonetic similarity is comprised of three components: (1) auditory similarity, (2) phonetic inventory, and (3) language-specific patterns of alternation.