The merger of falling tones: A perception study in Taiyuan Jin Chinese

Abstract

Traditionally, there are five lexical tones in Taiyuan dialect including one rising tone and four falling tones, but previous studies have shown that some speakers merged the four falling tones Ping Sheng (T1)/ Shang Sheng (T2)/ Yin Ru (T4)/ Yang Ru (T5) in production. The current study investigates how 25 participants (14 females) with different age groups perceive four falling tones by means of discrimination and identification tasks. Both accuracy rate and reaction time are measured. Results show that: (i) the stabilization sequence in perception is as follows: T2 > T1 > T4 > T5, indicating that T2 is the most stable tone while T5 is the most susceptible to merge with other tones. (ii) T4 and T5 exhibit the highest degree of merger, with a tendency to perceive T5 as T4. (iii) there are two stages of tone merger in Taiyuan dialect at the perceptual level. The pronounced confusion between T4 and T5 is at the first stage, with a primary trend of T5 merging into T4. And the confusion among T1 and the entering tones (Yin and Yang Ru) is at the second stage, indicating a possibility that the entering tones are more likely to merge with the non-entering tone, T1, after the loss of the glottal coda.