Perceptual training facilitates Mandarin tone production for preschoolers with cochlear implants: Evidence from acoustic analysis

This study primarily aimed to investigate the benefits of an established perceptual training in the production of lexical tones for Mandarin-speaking preschoolers with cochlear implants (CIs). Thirty-two pediatric CI recipients were tested in this study. Half of the child participants received five sessions of high variability phonetic training (HVPT) within a period of three weeks, whereas the other half served as control who did not receive the formal training. Production of Mandarin tones was recorded before the provision (pretest) and after (posttest) the completion of the training protocol, which was coded and analyzed acoustically with automatic pitch tracking implemented in the software of Praat. Results showed significantly enhanced concave characteristic of dynamic pitch contours for the trained children’s Mandarin tones produced in posttest relative to pretest using growth curve analysis. Moreover, a tonal ellipse analysis indicated significantly improved tone differentiability and tone hit rate from pretest to posttest following training. By contrast, no significant changes were observed in the control children between the two test sessions. The findings represent initial acoustic evidence of HVPT-induced benefits in lexical tone production for CI users, which supports the application of this perceptual training protocol to aural rehabilitation practice.