Introduction: phonological models and experimental data

Under traditional conceptions of linguistics, the phonology of a language ؛is restricted to a generally finite set of facts ؛ However, once linguistics is regarded as (and not merely called) cognitive psychology, phonology, even the phonology of the word, ceases to be a finite domain: the range of data is limited only by the investigator’s imagination in devising tasks that tap into his subjects’ phonological knowledge and is not limited to the existing vocabulary of the language. (McCawley 1986: 38)