Rhyme acceptability determined by perceived similarity

1.1 Some rhymes are better than other rhymes. Everyone would agree that home – bone is a better rhyme than home – dose. 1.2 Intuitively, home – bone is a better rhyme because those words are more similar to each other than the words in home – dose are. 1.3 Although there is general agreement that the goodness of a rhyme is determined by similarity, there are different suggestions for how rhyme similarity should be measured. 1.4 Some claim that the goodness of a rhyme is determined by similarity in articulatory features (Zwicky 1976, Berg 1990, Bauschatz 2003), others that it is determined by similarity in perception (Steriade 2003, Kawahara 2006). 1.5 Both sides point out individual cases that seem to argue against the other side (Zwicky 1976:689f, Berg 1990:22, Steriade 2003:593, Kawahara 2006:128ff.), but no full scale comparisons between the approaches exist. 1.6 The purpose of this study is just that – to provide a statistical comparison between the two approaches to see which is the better predictor of rhyme acceptability. 1.7 The results will show that similarity in perception is the better predictor.