At the edge of intonation: the interplay of utterance-final F0 movements and voiceless fricative sounds

The paper is concerned with the 'edge of intonation' in a twofold sense. It focuses on utterance-final F0 movements and crosses the traditional segment-prosody divide by investigating the interplay of F0 and voiceless fricatives in speech production. An experiment was performed for German with four types of voiceless fricatives: /f/, /s/, /ʃ/ and /x/. They were elicited with scripted dialogues in the contexts of terminal falling statement and high rising question intonations. Acoustic analyses show that fricatives concluding the high rising question intonations had higher mean centres of gravity (CoGs), larger CoG ranges and higher noise energy levels than fricatives concluding the terminal falling statement intonations. The different spectral-energy patterns are suitable to induce percepts of a high 'aperiodic pitch' at the end of the questions and of a low 'aperiodic pitch' at the end of the statements. The results are discussed with regard to the possible existence of 'segmental intonation' and its implication for F0 truncation and the segment-prosody dichotomy, in which segments are the alleged troublemakers for the production and perception of intonation

Using action research to teach students to manage team learning and improve teamwork satisfaction

This article reports on a study investigating strategies that students can use to develop skills in managing team learning. Two groups of second-year management students participated in a semester long action research project over two semesters. The students were educated on team development. team processes and conflict management and how to review and enhance team development. Teaching staff supported the approach and students were regularly encouraged to reflect on and learn about how their behaviour contributed to team effectiveness. This approach encouraged student participation and ownership as well as early intervention if problems arose. Findings suggest that when students are taught to manage the processes of teamwork and take greater ownership of managing conflict and team relations they report less conflict and less social loafing and are more satisfied with their learning outcomes