On misperception in rhoticisation and lambdacisation

Misperception is one of the sources of sound change. This study investigates to what extent misperception can account for rhoticisation of laterals and lambdacisation of rhotics. To this end, laterals and rhotics varying across different acoustic dimensions are embedded in logatomic word forms and presented to native listeners of Greek in a forced choice task. While lateral rhoticisation could be predicted as a function of lateral duration, with shorter laterals undergoing more perceptual confusion with rhotics than longer laterals – especially in intervocalic position–, the lateral’s degree of darkness had no effect on participants’ responses. Rhotic lambdacisation was high for rhotic approximants; taps and trills, however, were overwhelmingly correctly perceived as rhotics. An additional rhotic variant, a tap lacking the characteristic svarabhakti vocoid, yielded high rates of perceptual elision. The results of the experiment are discussed with respect to documented sound changes.