Positional and phonotactic effects on the realization of Taiwan Mandarin tone 2

This study investigates how phonotactics and sentential positioning affect the realization of Taiwan Mandarin Tone 2. 10 Taipei speakers read sentences containing target syllables of different syllable types in isolation and in various sentential positions. Results showed that comparing across five different phonotactic types, N-initial syllables were relatively high at the onset, the turning point, and the offset while G-initial syllables were low at all three points. V-initial syllables were high at the turning point and the offset while obstruent-initial syllables ended with relatively low pitch. In general, the offset is higher than the onset point when the syllable was read in isolation or sentence-finally. However, in sentence-initial and -medial positions, the onset tended to be higher in pitch than the offset, especially in female speech. V-initial syllables tended to have higher offsets than onsets regardless of positions. In terms of duration, the falling ratio is the highest sentence-medially. With L-initial and N-initial syllables, the falling ratio was over 50% of the total syllable sentence-medially and -finally. There was no difference in the degree of steepness between the falling and the rising portions of the tone, but female speakers in general showed steeper slopes than male, especially in sentence-final positions.