Abstract
This study confirms previous acoustic findings that yes-no questions and declarative questions have a higher register than declarative sentences. However, our perception tests show that in the formation of Mandarin questions intonation is not as important as in French. For yes-no questions with question particles, the question particles play the main role. The subjects perceived the yes-no questions without particles and the declarative questions as showing surprise on the part of the speaker, or as surprised questions. The study suggests that in Mandarin, question intonation and surprise intonation are one and the same.