PHONETIC EFFECTS ON AMERICAN ENGLISH FLAPPING: THE ROLE OF CONSONANT REPETITION

Abstract

The American English phonological flapping rule results in the weakening of /t/ phonemes when isolated in onset position between stressed and unstressed syllables (obligatorily) or two unstressed syllables (optionally). The productivity of the flapping rule is already known to vary depending on several different factors. I present here a pair of phonetic production studies suggesting that consonant repetition is one of those factors. Flapping is dispreferred if a sequence of multiple flaps would result.