The Covariation and Cue Trading Relation between VOT and F0 in Mandarin

Phonetic contrasts are typically cued by multiple acoustic cues. VOT and onset F0 were the two widely recognized cues for the voicing contrasts. Emerging evidence has shown that the weighting of these two cues varied across languages. The present study examined the covariation between VOT and onset F0 in Mandarin, and explored the cue trading relation of the two properties from the perspective of production. Results showed that VOT effectively differentiated between aspirated and unaspirated categories in Mandarin, highlighting VOT as a robust acoustic cue for aspiration contrasts. Additionally, onset F0 following aspirated consonants was higher compared to that following unaspirated counterparts, indicating a relatively weak role of onset F0 in distinguishing aspiration contrasts. Regarding the cue trading relation between VOT and onset F0, positive correlations were observed for Tone 1 in both aspirated and unaspirated categories. Conversely, negative correlations were observed for tone 2/3/4 in both consonant groups. Nonetheless, the lack of significant correlations across four tones suggested the improbability of a cue trading relation between VOT and onset F0 in Mandarin. The findings could provide insights into the naturalness and intelligibility of speech synthesis.