Earlier studies of Estonian showed that vowel quantity words (i.e. words dif-
fering only in vowel quantity) produced with an H*+L pitch accent differed
in their peak alignment: While words with a short and a long vowel had a
peak late in the vowel of the stressed syllable, words with an overlong vowel
were characterised by a peak earlier in the vowel (e.g. Asu et al., 2009; Lippus
et al., 2013). The main aim of this dissertation is to shed light on these peak
alignment differences: firstly, whether these alignment differences can be ex-
plained with the help of a segmental anchor; secondly, whether alignment is
similarily affected by quantity differences in consonants and vowels; thirdly,
whether such alignment differences are stable in regard to the prosodic con-
text, more precisely in regard to the number of post-focal unstressed syllables
(i.e. the vicinity to the sentence boundary) and a variation of the speaking
rate. Additionally, not only the peak alignment in regard to the vicinity
of an upcoming sentence boundary was investigated, but also the influence
of the sentence boundary on segment durations (phrase-final lengthening -
PFL). Previous studies (e.g. Krull, 1997; Asu et al., 2009) showed that PFL
occurs in Estonian, but it was not studied yet whether PFL affects vowel
and consonant quantity words differently. Furthermore no attempt made to
explain PFL in Estonian with the help of abstract phonological models. The
purpose of this dissertation is to fill this gap.
This dissertation contains three different experiments which are presented
in one chapter each. The first experiment (chapter 2) explored the influence
of the upcoming sentence boundary and its interaction with vowel (VQ)
and consonant (CQ) quantity on the peak alignment of falling nuclear H*+L
pitch accents. Disyllabic target words (C 1 V 1 C 2 V 2 ) only differing in either the
quantity of V 1 (VQ-words) or C 2 (CQ-words) were embedded in two different
carrier sentences: in one carrier sentence the target word was followed by two
unstressed syllables (long tail context) and in the other by none (short tail
ixcontext). All target words occured in three quantity degrees: short (Q1),
long (Q2) and overlong (Q3). There were two main results: (1) In the short
tail context the peak was aligned earlier. (2) The peak alignment of VQ- and
CQ-words was similar. Quantity degree differences of both VQ- and CQ-
words were cued by the peak alignment in proportion to the V 1 C 2 -duration.
The proportional peak alignment had the order Q3 < Q2 < Q1, where <
denotes that the peak of Q3-words was proportionally timed earlier than the
peak of Q2-words and so on.
The second experiment (chapter 3) analysed the influence of the sentence
boundary, i.e. phrase-final lengthening (PFL), on the segment durations of
VQ- and CQ-words. The data used for the analysis was the same as in the
first experiment. There were two main results: (1) The domain of PFL in
Estonian was the main bearer of the quantity contrast, i.e. V 1 in VQ-words
and C 2 in CQ-words and can be best accounted for in terms of a Structure-
based model for explaining PFL (Turk and Shattuck-Hufnagel, 2007). (2)
Progressive lengthening, i.e. the nearer a segment is to the final boundary
the more it is lengthened, occured in the data if the lengthened segments
were not in adjacent word-final position.
The third experiment (chapter 4) investigated whether speaking rate in-
fluences the alignment of the peak. VQ- and CQ-words were embedded in
carrier sentences with one unstressed syllable following the target word. They
were read in normal and fast speaking rate. There were two main results:
(1) In both VQ- and CQ-words the peak alignment in proportion to the
V 1 C 2 -duration had the order Q3 < Q2 < Q1, where < denotes that the
peak of Q3-words was aligned earlier than the peak of Q2-words and so on.
(2) Speaking rate did not influence the peak alignment in proportio