Etude préliminaire de la perception précoce des voyelles labialisées par des auditeurs déficients visuels

National audienceThe present research deals with auditory effects of anticipatory lip movements in [V1CV2] sequences, where V1 is vowel [i], C is the fricative [s] and V2 a rounded vowel [Vlab]. The aim of the investigation is triple: first, we wanted to observe for potential anticipatory acoustic effects of vowel rounding, when a speaker pronounces sequences which include vowels [y], [ï ], [u] or [o] in the V2 position. Secondly, attention is paid to the moment when sighted listeners may start to perceive probable anticipatory effects of the rounded vowel. Thirdly, the core purpose of this work was to analyse the behaviour of blind subjects carrying out the same experimental tasks. Results show that vowels [y] and [u] are perceived earlier than [ï ] and [o] by both control and blind subjects. When data for the control group and the group of blind subjects are compared, it is noticed that blind subjects perceive rounded vowels earlier than control sighted subjects