Acoustic Loci and Transitional Cues for Consonants

Previous studies with synthetic speech have shown that second-formant transitions are cues for the perception of the stop and nasal consonants. The results of those experiments can be simplified if it is assumed that each consonant has a characteristic and fixed frequency position, or locus, for the second formant, corresponding to the relatively fixed place of production of the consonant. On that basis, the transitions may be regarded as “movements” from the locus to the steady state of the vowel. The experiments reported in this paper provide additional evidence concerning the existence and positions of these second-formant loci for the voiced stops, b, d, and g. There appears to be a locus for d at 1800 cps and for b at 720 cps. A locus for g can be demonstrated only when the adjoining vowel has its second formant above about 1200 cps; below that level no g locus was found. The results of these experiments indicate that, for the voiced stops, the transition cannot begin at the locus and go from there to the steady-state level of the vowel. Rather, if we are to hear the appropriate consonant, the first part of the transition must be silent. The voiced stops are best synthesized by making the duration of the silent interval equal to the duration of the transition itself. An experiment on the first formant revealed that its locus is the same for b, d, and g.