Focus prosody in Qassimi Arabic: acoustic analysis and computational modeling
This study investigates focus intonation in Qassimi Arabic (QA) with two aims: to examine focus-related prosodic changes in the focused word and surrounding regions, and to identify the functional factors shaping intonation and their relative contributions. The analysis considers maximum, minimum, and mean F0, excursion size, duration, and intensity. The data comprise 1,800 utterances produced by ten native speakers in neutral-focus, information-focus, and contrastive-focus contexts. The acoustic results show that focus is realized primarily through enhancement of the focused word, especially through F0-register raising and, in some positions, increased pitch excursion. These effects are strongest in sentence-initial and sentence-penultimate positions, while sentence-final focus shows more limited register raising. The pre-focus region remains largely stable. In the broad post-focus region, information and contrastive focus are followed by significant intensity attenuation but no consistent changes in F0, excursion size, or duration. However, localized analysis of the post-focus word following sentence-penultimate focus reveals reduced excursion size after contrastive focus, but not after information focus. The results therefore indicate cue- and position-specific post-focus modification rather than general post-focus F0 compression. No consistent acoustic distinction emerges between information and contrastive focus across measures and positions. PENTAtrainer modeling reproduced major properties of the observed F0 contours, including on-focus prominence, declination, phrase-final lowering, and condition-dependent post-focus modification. Function-removal analyses showed that prosodic-word structure and discourse focus contributed most strongly, whereas syllable weight contributed least. Overall, the findings support a multi-functional account of Qassimi Arabic focus prosody and the applicability of the PENTA framework to Arabic intonation.
Experimental studies show that the prosodic realization of focus varies across Arabic dialects. This study examines focus in Bedouin Hijazi Arabic. Using the question-and-answer paradigm, eleven…
This study investigates focus intonation in Qassimi Arabic (QA) with two aims: to examine focus-related prosodic changes in the focused word and surrounding regions, and to identify the functional…
This study investigates how both information and contrastive focus in the Iraq Arabic dialect are prosodically realized, contributing to the ongoing debate on focus-marking across languages and…