Mandarin citation tone perception in prelingually deaf adults

• Autores: Yu Chen, Yinuo Wang, Shengqin Cao, Yang Li
• Localización: Lingua: International review of general linguistics, ISSN 0024-3841, Nº 328, 2025
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • Objective This study investigated how prelingually deaf adults (PDAs) with cochlear implants (CIs) or hearing aids (HAs) perceive Mandarin citation tones. The effects of rhyme complexity and hearing device type on tone identification were examined.

    Design Seventy-four Mandarin-speaking participants (30 normal-hearing, 18 CI users, and 26 HA users) completed a four-alternative forced-choice tone identification task. The stimuli included monosyllables with different rhyme complexities (simple, open, nasal) and tone pairings (six tone pairs). Mouse-tracking was used to capture response trajectories and timing.

    Results Normal-hearing participants showed higher accuracy than both deaf groups in all conditions. Tone pairs T2–T3 and T2–T4 were particularly challenging for CI and HA users. Rhyme complexity influenced only the deaf groups, and nasal rhymes showed the worst performance. Although CI users had more severe hearing loss, their performance was similar to that of HA users.

    Conclusions These results highlight the impact of tone types and rhyme complexity on Mandarin tone perception in PDAs and suggest the need for device-specific auditory training.