Perspectives on Arabic Linguistics XXXI

This study examines the interplay between a number of factors that affect speech rate perception. Three factors were investigated: pause type/length (short, long, and non-silent), actual speech rate (accelerated vs. decelerated), and utterance type (native Arabic, accented Arabic, and unfamiliar language). A group of Arabic speakers judged whether the sentences they heard were slow or fast, and rated their speed on a 1–7 scale (1 = extremely slow, 7 = extremely fast). The findings show that all