Lies, Damned Lies and Phonological Statistics.
Lies, Damned Lies and Phonological Statistics.
Anthologica Universe Atlas / Forums / Terra Firma / Lies, Damned Lies and Phonological Statistics. / Lies, Damned Lies and Phonological Statistics.

? Yaali Annar The Gote
posts: 94
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So I dicked around with Phoible data and decided to do some queries to find out some statistic about phonemes. Percentage means the percentage of language in the database (1673 un total) with that features.

First, vowel point of articulation. As expected, front and central vowels are prototypically unrounded and back vowels are protptypically rounded:

back rounded: 99,3%
front unrounded: 99,7%
central unrounded: 96,6%

And less common contra-roundedness are:

back unrounded: 18,9
front rounded: 6,6
central rounded: 6,5

Now, for the height, phoible data seems to only distinguish 5 height unlike upside who distinguish 7. But... eh... let's see the frequency of vowels by height:

tense high (high): 98,1
slack high (lowered high): 64,6
tense mid (higher mid): 88,7
slack mid (lower mid): 21,5
low: 99,8

Missing from the data is the true mid (i.e. where the schwa is) and the raised low (where /æ ɐ/ is)

Hey, let's combine them into a matrix! Due to the wonkiness of phoible data, I opt to use UPSID data instead:

frunfrroceuncerobaunbaro
high91,25,814,21,69,185,2
lowered high17,30,90,90,31,415,6
higher mid31,53,44,90,93,234,0
mid5,00,919,11,41,842,4
lower mid4,01,83,60,32,338,6
raised low1,00,03,60,30,30,3
low6,50,089,40,07,44,5