A cross-language study of range of voice onset time in the perception of initial stop voicing

A series of experiments was carded out to compare the extent of range effects in the phonetic ategorization. of voice onset ime (VOT} by speakers of Polish and of English, two languages which contrast different VOT categories. Results indicate that Poles are more prone to range effects than are Americans. For acoustic continua with appr•able numbers of prevoiced stimuli, monolingual Polish speakers' perceptual boundaries fall in the sap t•'tween their production categories. For ranges of VOT which include few prevoiced stimuli, their boundaries are substantially shitSed. Americans how no shif• of this type, although they do show some small shift• It was determined that the much smaller shiRs shown by the American subjects were not due to expectations about the test. Results are interpreted in terms of the different VOT contrasts involved: their spacing along the VOT continuum, and their psychophysical basis.