What makes a word prominent? Predicting untrained German listeners' perceptual judgments.

•Both prosodic and non-prosodic cues determine prominence perception.•All 17 variables tested were shown to affect prominence.•Pitch accent position and type are strongest determinants of prominence.•Listeners fall into two groups: pitch-guided listeners and lexical-syntactic listeners.•Prominence is a “redundant” system, being signaled by multiple cues.