Anticipatory coarticulation in V1#C2V2 sequences in standard Chinese

An electropalatographic and acoustic analysis was used to investigate the C2-to-V1 and V2-to-V1 anticipatory effects. The articulatory measures were obtained by the electropalatography (EPG) and the F2 trajectory by linear prediction coding (LPC). The results show that: 1) the F2 transition is significantly correlated with the posterior contact index; 2) a manner difference is found for linguapalatal contact and the F2 trajectory for V1 when C2 are labial, alveolar and velar consonants; 3) the anticipatory vocalic effect is significant for the F2 transition and/or EPG parameters for V1 when the C2 are labial, alveolar and velar consonants. The rounded feature of V2 tends to spread onto the V1 off-glide which affects the F2 transition of V1. The article concludes that the anticipatory effects are constrained by the articulatory constraints on the tongue body for intervocalic consonants and that the rounding feature of V2 is independent in the coarticulatory process.EI091220-12255