On the Perception of the Neutral Tone in Taiwan Mandarin

The neutral tone in Taiwan Mandarin (TM) behaves differently from that of Standard Mandarin. Many neutral-tone syllables in TM are not reduced and have a low pitch target regardless of the preceding tone. These neutral-tone syllables are therefore acoustically similar to Tone 3 syllables in TM. This paper investigates how TM listeners distinguish Tone 3 (low tone) from the neutral tone. The result shows that the end pitch is the primary cue. When the end pitch is higher than -1 z-score (the pitch ranges between -2 to 2 z-score), the listeners are more likely to perceive the stimulus as a neutral tone. Also, a convex pitch contour is more likely to be perceived as a neutral tone. Lastly, when the pitch information is ambiguous, the listeners rely on the vowel quality or the phonation type to distinguish the pairs. The results suggest that the neutral tone in TM slowly reaches to a mid-low target.