This study investigates the effect of noise marking on the identification of nasal consonants [m, n, ŋ] in VC syllables, in which V is [i, e, a, o, u]. These VC syllables, spoken by male phoneticians, were masked with white noise (60–4000 Hz), and played to subjects who were professors and graduate students of phonetics. There were four listening conditions with different signal‐to‐noise ratios. Preliminary results suggest three principal findings: (1) Nasals are correctly identified after [a] even in the noisiest condition, (2) [m]tends to be identified as [n] after the front vowels [i, e]and, less strongly, (3) [n] tends to be identified as [m]after the back rounded vowels [o, u]. These misidentifications of [m]and [n] occur more frequently in the noisier conditions. The results will be discussed in relation to patterns of sound change in syllable final nasals. [Research supported by NSF.]