A number of vowel mergers occur uniquely in Western Pennsylvania English before the consonant . The pair of vowels and may merge before the consonant, cause both "steel" and "still" to be pronounced as something like . Similarly, , , and may merge before , so that "pool", "pull", and "pole" may merge to something like . On the merger, Labov, Ash and Boberg (2006) note "the stereotype of merger of is based only on a close approximation of some forms, and does not represent the underlying norms of the dialect." The merger is found in western Pennsylvania, as well as parts of the southern United States, including Alabama, Texas and the west (McElhinny 1999). On the other hand, the merger is consistently found only in western Pennsylvania. The merger towards may also appear before : "eagle" then sounds to outsiders like "iggle". The vowel (as in "uh") before , may lower into the vowel of the cot–caught merger mentioned above, so that "mull" can sound identical to "mall/maul": .