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Shaping phrase-final rising intonation in German

Ernst Dombrowski & Oliver Niebuhr

Institut für Phonetik und digitale Sprachverarbeitung (IPdS) Seminar für allgemeine und vergleichende Sprachwissenschaft

Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Germany

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Present subjectForm and function of contour shape in German phrase-final rises

Starting point

Describing intonation in a contour-based approach

by a small set of parameters that determine

the shape of the contours.

Introduction

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Modelling the course of phrase-final rises

A two-point description allows to characterize alignment and F0-range of rises

Introduction

F0

t t

F0

t

F0A three-point description also renders the shape of rising movements

F0convex

concave

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German data Analysed the shape of constantly aligned nuclear rises:

rising movement already towards the accented-vowel onset, further rise up to the end of the melodic phrase

3-point model:

Range proportion to assess concave vs. convex rises

Dombrowski and Niebuhr 2005: corpus study based on the Kiel Corpus of Spontaneous Speech (IPDS 1995ff)

Introduction

(1) Rise onset, (2) Joint at the end of the accented syllable, (3) Rise offset

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Introduction

Range proportion: a parameter to measure the shape of rising movements.

offset

onset

joint

convex

concave

F0

t ●

●

●

●

Syllable with nuclear accent

End of phraseUnaccented syllables

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Introduction

Range in the first section

Total range

Range in the first section of the rise (up to the joint)

= Range Proportion(rprop)Total Range

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Formal categorization of the rises in Dombrowski & Niebuhr (2005) and in the present study:

Specifications of the early valley in the Kiel Intonation Modell (KIM, Kohler 1991).

Concave vs. convex rises may also be captured by GToBI labels (Grice & Baumann 2002) resulting in a collection of possible tonal configurations.

However, the range proportion of a rise is a contour feature that is expressed in the course of the nuclear pitch movement as a whole relating its 1st to the 2nd part.

It seems to control one unique communicative dimension.

Introduction

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Basic communicative meaning opposition in the addressee-related structuring of the discourse:

■ Activation vs. restriction

Augmenting or reducing choices of the addressee in a conversation.

Introduction

Turn-yielding and turn-holding, also forms of question and continuation.

Range proportion is the best predictor of the conditions, the total range does not contribute substantially.

Concave and convex phrase-final rises are preferred in different discourse conditions:

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Introduction

Two Examples

Sind sie Angela? ► ►‘Are you Angela?’

►

Concave: ‘Give me an answer and tell me a bit more about you.’ ► activating

Convex: ‘Just tell me the name.’ ► restricting

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Do listeners assign different semantic features to the two shapes of rises?

Do semantic interpretations interact with the composition of the segmental string underlying the melodic pattern, particularly with the syllable count?

Is there an interaction with the lexical semantics of the utterances?

Introduction

The semantic differential technique (Osgood, Suci, and Tan-nenbaum 1957) is used to answer these questions.

Question of the present study Acoustics and function of concave and convex rises have been analysed with data from the Kiel Corpus. Can the corpus results be confirmed in a perceptual task?

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Method

Stimulus utterances of the perceptual task

Six syntactically marked questions: (1a) Bist

du im Urlaub? (‘Are you on holiday?’) Bist du im Urlaub? (‘Are you on holiday?’) Bist du im Urlaub? (1a) Bist du im Urlaub? (‘Are you on holiday?’) (1b) Sind Sie der Eigentümer? (‘Are you the owner?’) (2a) Liegt das bei Lübeck? (‘Is that near to Lübeck?’) (2b) Liegt das in Niedersachsen? (‘Is that in Lower Saxony?’) (3a) Sind Sie Angela? (‘Are you Angela?’) (3b) Sind Sie Angelika? (‘Are you Angelika?’)

Combination of two variables with 2 and 3 steps: 1a) Bist du im Urlaub? (‘Are you on holiday?’) Bist du im Urlaub? (‘Are you on holiday?’) Bist

du im Urlaub? disyllabic vs. polysyllabic condition lexical semantics of the questions (fact, place, name)

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The stimulus utterances were produced naturally by a trained speaker.

F0 manipulation with PSOLA in praat. Final rise section stylized between the 3 contour points

rise onset, accented-syllable offset, rise offset. Middle contour point raised or lowered to create

a 0.2 and a 0.8 rprop condition.

Stimuli were judged on a Semantic differential (Osgood et al.1957) based on the activation-restriction concept.

Method

Production of the Stimuli

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(‘activating – restricting’) (‘calm – upset’) (‘emotional – non-emotional’) (‘friendly – unfriendly’) (‘gives room–narrows options’) (‘interested – not interested’) (‘inviting – rejecting’) (‘not challenging–challenging’) (‘not dominant – dominant’) (‘open – closed’) (‘question. – non-questioning’) (‘spontaneous utterance –

rjroutine utterance’)

Method

12 semantic scales: 7 steps (3-2-1-0-1-2-3)

Specific predictions concerning 10 scales

aktivierend – hemmend ruhig – erregt emotional – nicht emotional freundlich – unfreundlich gibt Spielraum – schränkt ein interessiert – uninteressiert einladend – abweisend nicht herausf.– herausfordernd nicht dominant – dominant offen – geschlossen fragend – nichtfragend spontane Äußerung –

Routineäußerung

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Method

Total of 12x12=144 stimuli The 6 utterances were randomized, semantic scales

were randomized Each stimulus was judged on one scale at a time 31 naïve Northern Standard German listeners

participated, 11 male, 20 female, undergraduates at Kiel University

Arrangement of the experimental task, procedure, subjects

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Statistical evaluation

Repeated measures MANOVA, 4 factors and interactions

Results

Factor 1: range proportion, rprop 0.2 vs. 0.8 Factor 2: syllable count, 2 vs 3 or 4 syllables in the

nuclear stretch Factor 3: utterance pairs (3 semantic conditions) Factor 4: listener’s gender

Discriminant analyses

(1) to interprete significant main effects and interactions, particularly semantic differences between rprop 0.2 and 0.8, (2) to get classification rates based on the semantic profiles of the contour shapes.

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The factor range proportion is clearly significant (p=.000, η²=0.981). Average scale-point differences of 0.9 between the contour shapes. For ‘activating – restricting’ and ‘spon-taneous utterance – routine utterance’ larger differences.

Syllable count and utterance pairs also significant, but smaller scale-point differences. No gender effects.

Interactions between range proportion, syllable count, and utterance pairs. Average scale-point differences are 1.1 in the disyllabic condition, only 0.7 in the polysyllabic condi-tion (although both are significant: p=0.000, η²=0.954 and η²=0.942).

Important: interaction range proportion x syllable count.

Results

MANOVA results:

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Results

The nature of this interaction can be elucidated by discriminant analyses (DA) on the utterances with disyllabic vs. polysyllabic nucleus.

They show meaning differences between concave and convex rises (rprop 0.2 vs. 0.8) in both conditions.

Both DAs are significant (canonical correlations of 0.805 and 0.679, df=12, p=0.000 in both cases)

Discriminant analyses:

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Results rprop 0.2 rprop 0.8 weights loadings p

activating restricting .623 .359 .000

calm upset .357 .327 .267

emotional non-emotion. -.281 .105 .148

friendly unfriedly .312 -.053 .000

gives room narrows opt. .142 .269 .000

interested not interest. .301 -.257 .000

inviting rejecting .005 .317 .052

not challeng. challenging .225 -.043 .000

not dominant dominant .295 .549 .000

open closed .278 .232 .000

questioning not question. .203 .210 .000

spontaneous routine .405 .296 .000(a)

DA

dis

ylla

bic

nu

clea

r ri

ses

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Results

Activating – restricting Spontaneous utterance – routine utterance Questioning – non-questioning Interested – not interested

Collection of scales characterizing rprop 0.2 vs. rprop 0.8 in disyllabic nuclear rises

‘Activating – restricting’ contributes most.

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Results

rprop 0.2 rprop 0.8   weights loadings p

activating restricting -.080 .368 .294

calm upset .339 .329 .000

emotional non-emotion. .342 .133 .000

friendly unfriedly .225 .089 .001

gives room narrows opt. .107 .284 .059

interested not interest. .163 .270 .000

inviting rejecting -.436 -.327 .947

not challeng. challenging .336 .004 .000

not dominant dominant .225 .478 .001

open closed .436 .237 .000

questioning not question. .601 .236 .000

spontaneous routine .257 .286 .001(b)

DA

po

lysy

llab

ic n

ucl

ear

rise

s

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Results

Open - closed Questioning – non-questioning Calm – upset

Collection of scales characterizing rprop 0.2 vs. rprop 0.8 in polysyllabic nuclear rises

‘Open – closed’ contributes most. ‘Activating – restricting’ does not contribute.

Profile differences are mainly determined by judgements on concave rises (low range proportion).

The discriminant factor is mainly characterized by the scales not ‘dominant – dominant’ and ‘activating – restricting’.

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Rate of correct predictions of the judged stimulus type (rprop 0.2 vs. 0.8) based on the discriminant functions and the semantic profiles.

Results for 6x2 stimulus utteran-ces

Results

Classification rates

Disyllabic condition

Polysyllabic condition

Asking for a name (Angela, Angelika)

100,0% 100,0%

Asking for a place (Lübeck, Niedersachsen)

96,8% 88,7%

Asking for a fact in a conversation (Urlaub, Eigentümer)

91,9% 82,3%

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The meaning profiles of concave and convex phrase-final rises are different.

Thus, data support the claim of two communicative types of rising movements.

The terms activation vs. restriction characterize the meaning of the two types.

The concave shape has no clear meaning profile in the polysyllabic nucleus condition.

Discussion

Deviation from the general line

General line of the findings

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Discussion

Clear relative hight of the first step of the rise and proportion of the following perhaps gliding movement: . Activation – restriction

Only a general impression of an extended or less extended rising movement in the polysyllabic condition: . Open – closed

Perhaps two signalling mechanisms prevailing in the disyllabic vs. polysyllabic conditions of the experiment:

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Discussion

F0

t (in %)●

●

●

●variable end of acc. syllable

onset

offset

end of phrasesyllable with nuclear accent

How to adjust the contour model? Position of the second pitch point (joint) depends on rhythmic or temporal structure. It only coincides with the end of the accented syllable if there are at least two nuclear syllables and just one before the second point.

variable position of 2nd pitch point

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Discussion

Range proportion controls the relation between pitch information in the first part and in the second part of a rising movement, in particular the hight of the initial rising step and the amount of the sometimes gliding final part.

Thus, it contributes to two holistic contour shapes, concave and convex, used in communication and related to the meaning distinction of activation vs. restriction.

The two shapes can also be related to the notion of intonemes in Stock and Zacharias (1982) and Mixdorff and Pfitzinger (2005): Contact intoneme vs. non-terminal intoneme.

Final remarks

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End

Thank you for listening

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End

Thank you for listening

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End

Thank you for listening

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References

Ambrazaitis, G. (2006). Prosodic signalling of (un)expected information in South Swedish – An interactive manipulation experiment. Proc. 3rd Inter-national Conference on Speech Prosody, Dresden, Germany, 911-914.

Asu, E.L. (2006). “Rising intonation in Estonian: an analysis of map task dialogues and spontaneous conversations”. Phonetic Symposium 2006, Helsinki, Finnland, 1-9.

Boersma, P. (2001). “Praat – a system for doing phonetics by computer”. Glot International 5, 341-345.

Dombrowski, E. (2003). “Semantic features of accent contours: Effects of F0 peak position and F0 time shape”, Proc. 15th ICPhS, Barcelona, Spain, 1217-1220.

Dombrowski, E. and Niebuhr, O (2005). “Acoustic patterns and commu-nicative functions of phrase-final F0 rises in German: Activating and restricting contours”, Phonetica 62: 176-195.

Dombrowski, E. and Niebuhr, O. (2005). “Phrase-final rises in German: some examples”. URL http://www.ipds.unikiel.de/kjk/forschung/lautmus-ter.en.html, 2005, accessed on 10 Nov 2009.

Grice, M. and Baumann, S. (2002). “Deutsche Intonation und GToBI”, Linguist. Ber. 191: 267-298.

IPDS (1995, 1996, 1997). The Kiel Corpus of Spontaneous Speech. Vol. 1-3. Institut für Phonetik und digitale Sprachverarbeitung, Kiel

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References

Kohler, K. (1991). „A model of German intonation“. AIPUK 25, Christian-Albrechts-Universität, Kiel, 295-360.

Kohler, K.(1991). “Prosody in speech synthesis: the interplay between basic research and TTS application”. JPhon 19, 121-138, 1991.

Kohler, K. (2005). “Timing and communicative functions of pitch contours”, Phonetica 62: 88-105.

Mixdorf , J. and Pfitzinger, H. (2005). “Analysing fundamental frequency contours and local speech rate in map task dialogs, Speech communica-tion 46: 310-325.

Niebuhr, O. and Kohler, K.J. (2004). “Perception and cognitive processing of tonal alignment in German”. Proc. of the International Symposium TAL, Beijing, China, 155-158.

Petrone, C. and Niebuhr, O. (2009). “The role of the prenuclear F0 region in the identification of German questions and statements. Paper presented at the 4th PaPI conference, Las Palmas, Spain, http://www.linguistik.uni-kiel.de/Niebuhr_index.html.

Petrone, C. and D’Imperio, M. (2008). “From tones to tunes: The contribution of the prenuclear region in the identification of intonation contours in Italian”. Paper presented at the 3rd Conference on Tone and Intonation, Lisbon, Portugal.

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References

Pierrehumbert, J. (1980). “The phonetics of English intonation”. Bloomington: IULC, 1980.

Osgood, C., Suci, G. and Tannenbaum (1957). “The measurement of meaning”, Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.

Stock, E and Zacharias, C. (1982). “Deutsche Satzintonation”, Leipzig: VEB Verlag Enzyklopädie.

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Shaping phrase-final rising intonation in German

Ernst Dombrowski & Oliver Niebuhr

Institute of Phonetics and Digital Speech Processing, Department of General and Comparative Linguistics

Christian-Albrechts-University Kiel, Germany

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Present subjectForm and function of contour shape in German phrase-final rises

Starting point

Describing intonation in a contour-based approach

by a small set of parameters that determine

the shape of the contours.

Introduction

Previous studies on related issues: e.g. Dombrowski & Niebuhr 2005, Asu 2006, Petrone & D‘Imperio 2008, Petrone & Niebuhr 2009, Mixdorf & Pfitzinger 2005

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Modelling the course of phrase-final rises

A two-point description allows to characterize alignment and F0-range of rises

Introduction

F0

t t

F0

t

F0A three-point description also renders the shape of rising movements

convex

concave

36

Introduction

Range proportion: a parameter to measure the shape of rising movements.

offset

onset

joint

convex

concave

F0

t ●

●

●

●

Syllable with nuclear accent

End of phraseUnaccented syllables

37

Introduction

Range proportion: a parameter to measure the shape of rising movements.