Cognitive Mechanisms and Locus of Tone Sandhi during Chinese Spoken Word
Production
Jenn-Yeu Chen, Train-Min Chen, You-Yu Dai
Abstract: Cognitive mechanisms of tone sandhi during Chinese spoken word
production were investigated with the implicit priming paradigm. Participants
produced a disyllabic spoken word upon seeing a visual word that was associated by
prior learning with the spoken word. When the spoken words in a homogeneous block
shared the first syllables and their tones, response times were faster than when they
had nothing in common, indicating an advantage of advanced preparation of the first
tonal syllable. The sizes of the preparation effects were similar for words that were
rendered homogeneous after tone sandhi (Experiment 1, e.g., 起舞 qi3-wu3, 乞討
qi3-tao3, 奇險 qi2-xian3, 祈禱 qi2-dao3) and for words that were homogeneous prior
to tone sandhi (Experiment 2, e.g., 導 演 dao3-yan3, 搗 鬼 dao3-gui3, 倒 楣
dao3-mei2, 島國 dao3-guo2). A control experiment (Experiment 3) where the first
syllables of the spoken words in a homogeneous block assumed tone 2 and tone 3 but
involved no tone sandhi revealed a similar preparation effect comparable in size with
those involving tone sandhi. A second control experiment (Experiment 4) using tone 1
and tone 3 without involving tone sandhi produced a reduced effect. The results of
Experiment 1 suggest that disyllabic words with two third tones may be stored in the
post-tone-sandhi form (i.e., as T2-T3). The results of Experiment 2 and 3 suggest that
tone sandhi is an articulatory operation when carried out online. This conclusion is
based on the fact that the phonetic values of Tone 2 and Tone 3 share the initial part
(low, dipping) of their pitch contours. Participants of the experiment might have
prepared the first syllable up to the articulatory gesture involving the initial portion of
the tonal contour. They could then shift the gestural movement with no apparent delay
to accommodate the subsequent portion of the tonal contour, which is different for
Tone 2 and Tone 3. Research from hand and arm reaching studies offers support for
this conclusion.
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