The Relationship between Word-initial Consonants and Accent Patterns of Korean Learners of Japanese : The result of an aural judgement of the Japanese native speakers

This study investigated the relationship between the production of Japanese word-initial consonants and pitch patterns by Korean learners of Japanese. To examine this, an auditory perception task on collected utterances was conducted to Japanese native speakers. Results indicated that utterances of Korean learners of Japanese of word-initial consonants were perceived as voiced by Japanese native speakers in the judgment task when it is uttered in an LHLL pitch pattern. On the other hand, Japanese native speakers perceived word initial consonants as voiceless when it was uttered in an HHLL or an LHLL pitch pattern. Taken together, the results suggest that Korean learners of Japanese tend to produce word initial voiced stops when the word initial is a voiceless stop with an LHLL pitch pattern