Intonation

According to Lanham (1982: 343), CFE has especially distinctive intonation contours, with little use of falling pitch in statements and a tendency for rising pitch in final accented syllables. Douglas (1984, cited in Wood 1987: 116) found that, compared to RP, tone-units were shorter, and there were more cases of nuclear tones (implying greater nuclear pitch movement) and of rising tones, especially with rising tails. According to Wood, the latter observation correlates with the impression that CFE tends to have more rising intonations, especially noticeable in the case of statements.