?url_ver=Z39.88-2004&rft_val_fmt=info%3Aofi%2Ffmt%3Akev%3Amtx%3Adc&rft.title=A+destressing+%22deafness%22+in+French%3F&rft.creator=Dupoux%2C+E.&rft.creator=Pallier%2C+C.&rft.creator=Sebastian%2C+N.&rft.creator=Mehler%2C+J.&rft.subject=Cognitive+Psychology&rft.subject=Psycholinguistics&rft.description=French+is+a+language+in+which+accent+is+mandatory+on+the+last+syllable+of+every+content+word.+In+contrast%2C+Spanish+uses+accent+to+distinguish+different+lexical+items+(e.g.%2C+b'ebe+vs+beb'e).+Two+population+of+subjects+were+tested+on+the+same+materials+to+study+whether+such+linguistic+differences+have+an+impact+on+the+perceptual+capacities+of+listeners.+In+Experiment+1%2C+using+an+ABX+paradigm%2C+we+find+that+French+Subjects+have+a+surprising+deficit+compared+to+Spanish+Subjects+in+making+accent+distinctions.+In+Experiment+2%2C+we+find+that+Spanish+subjects+cannot+ignore+irrelevant+differences+in+accent+in+a+phoneme-based+ABX+task%2C+whereas+French+Subjects+have+no+difficulty+at+all.+In+Experiment+3%2C+we+replicate+the+basic+French+finding%2C+and+find+that+Spanish+subjects+benefit+from+redundant+accent+information+even+when+phonemic+information+alone+is+sufficient+to+perform+the+task.+In+our+final+Experiment+4%2C+we+show+that+French+subjects+can+hear+the+acoustic+correlates+of+accent%3B+their+problem+seem+to+arise+at+the+level+of+short+term+memory.+Implications+for+language-specific+processing+and+acquisition+are+discussed.&rft.date=1997&rft.type=Journal+(Paginated)&rft.type=PeerReviewed&rft.format=application%2Fpostscript&rft.identifier=http%3A%2F%2Fcogprints.org%2F749%2F1%2Fvasujml.ps&rft.format=application%2Fpdf&rft.identifier=http%3A%2F%2Fcogprints.org%2F749%2F5%2Fvasujml.pdf&rft.identifier=++Dupoux%2C+E.+and+Pallier%2C+C.+and+Sebastian%2C+N.+and+Mehler%2C+J.++(1997)+A+destressing+%22deafness%22+in+French%3F++%5BJournal+(Paginated)%5D+++++&rft.relation=http%3A%2F%2Fcogprints.org%2F749%2F