Temporal and Articulatory Adjustments under Degraded Auditory Feedback in Mandarin Tone Production

Motivation

This study investigated whether degraded auditory feedback results in temporal and articulatory adjustments in Mandarin tone production.

Method

Facial video and ultrasound tongue imaging were used to track articulatory movements. Five native Mandarin speakers produced syllables with different tones under normal and noise-masked feedback.

Results

Noise generally lengthened syllable duration, with the largest increase in Tone 3 and effects varying across syllable positions. Articulatory responses were less uniform: all speakers showed feedback condition differences, but the magnitude and direction of adjustment varied across articulators and speakers. Lip aperture showed the most consistent increase in movement, whereas tongue responses were more variable. Tone further conditioned the response, but tone-related articulatory changes were largely speaker-specific. These findings suggest that hyperarticulation involves complex articulatory adjustments shaped jointly by phonological structure and individual articulatory strategies, rather than a monolithic alteration of speech.