On perceptual pitch relevance (based on the materials of declarative and interrogative sentences in the Ossetian language)

The article deals with the results of instrumental and perceptual analysis of the Ossetian intonation components of interrogative and declarative sentences. To clarify pitch relevance of simple declarative and interrogative sentences in the Ossetian language an instrumental research was carried out among native speakers of Ossetian and people who don’t speak it. Declarative sentences from Ossetian literature were used as an experimental material. Then, these sentences were transformed into interrogative sentences without changing the word order and content, in order to avoid additional markers helping to define the communicative type of the sentence. All the sentences were divided into syntagmas in accordance with speakers. The results were analyzed by Student’s t-criterion to difine whether answers were given at random or not. Authentically correctly recognized, authentically incorrectly recognized stimula were given by native speakers and non speakers. There were also random answers that were not further analyzed. The results of the experiment showed that first parts of declarative and interrogative sentences and final parts of interrogative sentences are as well unrepresentative to determine the perceptual relevance. Pitch line both of declarative and interrogative sentences represents rise - fall. The final syntagmas of interrogative sentences can have both rise - fall and fall - rise tone. In the Russian-speaking audience other intonation components except melody are of importance for the perception and they require further examination and analysis.