영어 치경폐쇄음과 설탄음의 자질보존성과 지각적 유사성

Feature Preservation and Perceptual Similarity of English Alveolar Stop and Flap Sound

This paper is the study discussing the motivation for flap sound as an allophone of alveolar stop in the view of the perceptual similarity and feature preservation. Even though alveolar stops are the most constricted obstruents, they can be realized as flap [ɾ] in a certain environment, which seems to have quite different property from alveolar stops. In this point, since we assume that a phoneme and its allophone must share specific characteristics of features, we look into the perceptual similarity from their features and acoustic cues through Spectrogram. When alveolar stop is situated in onset of the syllable, it shows VOT interval, which flap also has in onset even though it’s very short. The reason why alveolar stops are more influenced by their environment than any other consonant, is attributed to the fact that they have weaker feature preservation than other sounds. Therefore we examine if flapping is also the result of weak feature preservation of alveolar stop. To identify what perceptual similarity alveolar stops and flap have, this study searches for common perceptual cues in their positions of syllables. By analyzing them with OT, we show that alveolar stops can turn into flap in onset due to the constraints of perceptual similarity and feature preservation.