The processing of rises and falls (working title)

My project is concerned with a better understanding of the role of rises and falls in attention orienting by exploring the position of a pitch event in relation to prosodic structure (i.e., edge tone vs. pitch accent), the pitch trajectory (i.e., rise vs. fall), as well as the role of a pitch event within a larger domain. 

Pitch rises are claimed to be more prominent than falls as well as that evoke looming effects (e.g., Bach et al., 2008; Macdonald & Cambell, 2011). Yet previous work on this line of research tested only non-speech material. Departing from previous research, my project intends to investigate rising and falling intonation contours in a linguistic context. Using ERP studies and particularly focusing on the mismatch negativity neurophysiological response (MMN) (e.g., Näätänen, 1992), I want to explore whether rises are per se more prominent than falls, as well as whether the nature of the acoustic cues that make information more prominent is situated at a general cognitive level (auditory looming) or if they have also linguistic basis. The processing of information is highly affected by speakers’ or listeners’ expectations (e.g., Grice et al., 2017; Roessig et al., 2019). These expectations are in part driven by discourse aspects but can also be driven by language- and situational-specific expectations. Thus, I intend to complement the investigation of rises as markers of prominence by exploring the language-specific processing of rising and falling contours in different positions (e.g., accentual and boundary rises; accentual and boundary falls). In German, the accentual rise and the boundary rise can both be used for marking non-finality in lists, while accentual and boundary falling contours tend to mark finality. Investigating the consequences of the two different types of rising and falling contours in contexts where can naturally occur, will allow for a better understanding of how rises that have been found to attract attention (looming) by virtue of being acoustically prominent are reflected in language and whether the position of the rise affects the underlying processes.

In previous work on the intonation of languages with both pitch accents and edge tones, pitch accents are claimed to be the primary markers of prominence, (head prominence), while boundary tones are considered to be secondary in terms of prominence marking (edge prominence) with the main function to delimit phrases (e.g., Grice et al., 2005). Nevertheless, there is some evidence that rising at edges seems to cue some degree of prominence (e.g., Grice et al., 2019).  Using behavioral tasks and acoustic analyses of production data, my project aims to further investigate the extent to which head or edge associated rises lead to prominence perception. I plan to carry out these tasks in Maltese. The rationale behind the choice of the Maltese language is that whereas Maltese has regular pitch accents associated with lexical stress, tones (e.g., early H peaks) can be associated, as well, with word-initial (left edge of the word) syllables in wh-questions, exclamatives, and vocatives, lending prominence to the word that the tone appears (Grice et al., 2019). The results on the contribution to prominence of rises/peaks in different prosodic positions will have far-reaching implications for intonation theory since the typological prediction is that languages with head prominence (pitch accents) do not use edge tones as a mechanism for cueing prominence.

Overall, my project aims to focus on the differential processing of rises/peaks and falls, to explore the different dimensions of prominence in prosodic structure, and to shed light on the cognitive and functional contribution of rises to prominence. 

 

Biography

Maria Lialiou graduated in 2017 from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki where she studied Linguistics with a minor in Philology. Her vast interest in experimental linguistics brought her to Potsdam University in 2018 where she pursued her master's studies in experimental and clinical linguistics. During her M.Sc. studies, she enriched her theoretical knowledge in linguistics with practical experience while working first as an intern and later as a research assistant, at the laboratory of phonology and phonetics at Potsdam University. The research ideas of this group inspired her work and stimulated her focus on laboratory phonology and phonetics. In her master thesis “Syllabic structure and temporal organization in /sC/ sequences” she investigated cross-linguistically the relation between linguistic representations and vocal tract action in the domain of syllables. A sub-result in her master’s thesis project arose her interest in intonation, and in April 2021 she joined the SFB 1252 "Prominence in Language", A01 project "Intonation and attention orienting: Neurophysiological and behavioral correlates". Since July 2021 she is a doctoral student in the a.r.t.e.s. Integrated Track and attends the graduate class 8. Her doctoral project on the processing of rises and falls is supervised by Petra Schumacher and Martine Grice.

 

Contact

mlialiouuni-koeln.de

 

Peer-Reviewed Journal articles

Katsika, K., Lialiou, M., & Allen, S. (in prep.). The influence of case and word order in children and adults’ processing of relative clauses in Greek. Languages. (Special Issue "New Glances at the Morphosyntax of Greek").

Lialiou, M., Sotiropoulou, S., & Gafos, A.I. (2021). Spatiotemporal coordination patterns in word-medial stop-lateral and s-stop clusters of American English. Phonetica, (), 000010151520212010. https://doi.org/10.1515/phon-2021-2010

 

Conference Proceedings (Peer-Reviewed)

Lialiou, M., Albert, A., Vella, A., & Grice, M. (accepted). Periodic energy mass on head and edge tones in Maltese wh-constructions. In Proceedings of the 1^st International Conference on Tone and Intonation, University of Southern Denmark.

Ghaffarvand M. P., & Lialiou, M. (to appear). Does cross-linguistic acoustic similarity predict perception of non-native vowels? In Proceedings of the 12^th Pronunciation in Second Language Learning and Teaching Conference, Brock University, Canada.

Manuscripts

Lialiou, M. (2020). Syllabic structure and temporal organization in /sC/ sequences (Master Thesis). Potsdam Universität, Potsdam, Germany. [pdf]

 

Talks and posters at international conferences and workshops (peer & abstract reviewed)

Lialiou, M., Albert, A., Vella, A., & Grice, M. (2021). Periodic energy mass on head and edge tones in Maltese wh-constructions. Poster at the 1^st International Conference on Tone and Intonation, December 6-9, Sonderborg, Denmark. [abstract]

Katsika, K., Lialiou, M., & Allen, S. (2021). Effects of word order and case in the processing of relative clauses in heritage speakers of Greek in Germany. Talk at New Approaches to Bilingualism and Multilingualism and Language Learning/Teaching, November 20-21, Nicosia, Cyprus. [abstract]

Katsika, K., Lialiou, M., & Allen, S. (2021). Real-time processing of relative clauses in heritage        speakers of Greek in Germany. Talk at Crosslinguistic Perspectives on Processing and Learning, September 16-17, Zurich. [abstract]

Katsika, K., Lialiou, M., & Allen, S. (2021). Bilingual processing of complex structures; evidence from heritage Greek. Talk at the Conference on Multilingualism (online conference), June 23-15, Konstanz, Germany. [abstract]

Katsika, K., Lialiou, M., & Allen, S. (2021). Online processing of relative clauses in monolingual and bilingual children: evidence from heritage Greek. Poster at the XV International Symposium of Psycholinguistics, (online conference), June 22-25, Madrid, Spain.

Lialiou, M., & Ghaffarvand M. P. (2021). Does cross-linguistic acoustic similarity predict perception of non-native vowels?Poster at the 12^th Annual Pronunciation in Second Language and Teaching Conference (online conference), June 18-19, Brock University, Canada. [abstract] [poster] [audio presentation]

Katsika, K., Lialiou, M., & Allen, S. (2021). Online relative clause processing in monolingual and successive bilingual children with Greek as a heritage language. Poster at the 13^th Heritage Language (Virtual) Institute, National Heritage Language Resource Center (UCLA), June 7-10, California, Los Angeles, USA. [poster] [video presentation]

Lialiou, M., Sotiropoulou, S., & Gafos, A. I. (2020). Temporal Patterns in word-medial clusters of American English. Poster at the 17^th Old World Conference in Phonology (OCP 17), February 5-7, Warsaw, Poland. [abstract] [poster]

 

Invited talks
Lialiou, M. (2021). Syllabic structure and temporal organization in word-internal /sC/ sequences. Invited talk at the University of Potsdam, Linguistics Department, Phonology and Phonetics work group (Phopho colloquium), March 29.

Lialiou, M. (2020). Spanish /sC/ sequences; articulatory data segmentation. Invited talk at the University of Potsdam, Linguistics Department, Phonology and Phonetics work group (Phopho colloquium), July 23.

Lialiou, M. (2020). Syllabic structure and temporal organization of /sC/ sequences: insights from Spanish. Invited talk at the University of Potsdam, Linguistics Department, Phonology and Phonetics work group (Phopho colloquium), July 2.


Awards
2021: International Phonetic Association (IPA) Student Award for my poster “Periodic energy mass on head and edge tones in Maltese wh-constructions.” 1^st Conference on Tone and Intonation, Denmark, 2021

2016: Erasmus+ International Credit Mobility Programme for B.A. studies in Linguistics Department of Linguistics, Potsdam Universität, Germany, April – September 2016
 
 

Teaching/ Guest lectures
Winter term 2020/21: Topics in Phonology (BSc Linguistics, Seminar), with Stavroula Sotiropoulou, (University of Potsdam).