Abstract
This study sought to determine if the syntactic location of a speech pause might affect its apparent duration. Ss listened to a continuous discourse, being required to attend to its content as well as to make judgments, now and then, as to the duration of particular pauses. For pauses all actually of the same length, it was found that those falling at a minor within-sentence break, as syntactically defined, were characteristically judged to be longer than those falling at a major within-sentence break or at a between-sentence break, with no difference between the two latter cases. These results, obtained in a perceptual task involving a minimum of extraordinary or disruptive features, are taken as evidence for the power of syntactic variables in affecting attention during listening to speech.
Article PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
References
ABRAMS, K., & BEVER, T. G. Syntactic structure modifies attention during speech perception and recognition. Quarterly Journal of ExperimentalPsychology, 1969, 21, 291–298.
BEVER, T. G., KIRK, R., & LACKNER, J. R. An autonomicreflection ofsyntactic structure. Neuropsychologia, 1969, 7, 23–28.
BEVER, T. G., LACKNER, J. R., & KIRK, R. The underlying structures of sentences are the primary units in speech perception. Perception & Psychophysics, 1969, 5, 225–234.
BOOMER, D. S. Hesitation and grammatical encoding. Language & Speech, 1965, 8, 148–158.
CLARK, H. H. The importance of linguistics for the study of speech hesitations. In D. L. Horton and J. J. Jenkins (Eds.),The perception of language. In press.
FODOR, J.A., & BEVER, T. G. The psychological reality of linguistic segments. Journal of Verbal Learning & Verbal Behavior, 1965, 4, 414–420.
FRAISSE, P.The psychology of time. New York: Harper & Row, 1963.
FRANKENHAEUSER, M.Estimation of time: An experimental study. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1959.
GARRETT, M., & FODOR, J. A. Psychological theories and linguistic constructs. In T. R. Dixon and D. L. Horton (Eds.),Verbal behavior and general behaviortheory. Englewood Cliffs, N.J: Prentice-Hall, 1968. P. 596.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Additional information
This research was supported in part by USPHS Grant MH10006 from the National Institute of Mental Health. The writer is indebted to A. Horowitz for his aid in running Ss and analyzing the data.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Fillenbaum, S. Syntactic locus as a determinant of judged pause duration. Perception & Psychophysics 9, 219–221 (1971). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03212633
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03212633