Context, Predictability and Phonetic Attention

Lindblom et al. (1995) proposed two modes of listening to speech: a “what” mode, in whichlisteners focus on meaning, and a “how” mode, where listeners attend to details ofpronunciation. This theory fits with Hickok and Poeppel’s (2004, 2007) more recent dualstream model of speech perception. What conditions then are necessary for modulating the useof one listening mode or the other? Following observations concerning the effect of higher levellinguistic information on speech perception (Cole & Jakimik 1980, etc.), I will detail the resultsof two experiments which consider how structural and semantic context (word predictability)interact with the listener’s attention to phonetic details. The experiments use the phoneticaccommodation or imitation paradigm (Goldinger 1998, etc.) as a tool to determine whatphonetic details subjects noticed after hearing target words in a variety of contexts. The firstexperiment compares the degree of accommodation in isolated phrase vs. sentence context.The second experiment considers how the variable of word predictability within the context ofa sentence influences the degree of accommodation. The results suggest listeners attend moreclosely to sub-phonemic details of pronunciation when less structural and semantic context ispresent and that contextual predictability modulates phonetic attention