Calibration of Consonant Perception to Room Reverberation

Purpose We examined how consonant perception is affected by a preceding speech carrier simulated in the same or a different room, for different classes of consonants. Carrier room, carrier length, and carrier length/target room uncertainty were manipulated. A phonetic feature analysis tested which phonetic categories are influenced by the manipulations in the acoustic context of the carrier. Method Two experiments were performed, each with nine participants. Targets consisted of 10 or 16 vowel–consonant (VC) syllables presented in one of two strongly reverberant rooms, preceded by a multiple-VC carrier presented in either the same room, a different reverberant room, or an anechoic room. In Experiment 1, the carrier length and the target room randomly varied from trial to trial, whereas in Experiment 2, they were fixed within a block of trials. Results Overall, a consistent carrier provided an advantage for consonant perception compared to inconsistent carriers, whether in anechoic or differently reverberant rooms. Phonetic analysis showed that carrier inconsistency significantly degraded identification of the manner of articulation, especially for stop consonants and, in one of the rooms, also of voicing. Carrier length and carrier/target uncertainty did not affect adaptation to reverberation for individual phonetic features. The detrimental effects of anechoic and different reverberant carriers on target perception were similar. Conclusions The strength of calibration varies across different phonetic features, as well as across rooms with different levels of reverberation. Even though place of articulation is the feature that is affected by reverberation the most, it is the manner of articulation and, partially, voicing for which room adaptation is observed.

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Calibration of consonant perception to room reverberation

10.1101/2020.09.01.277590 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Eleni Vlahou ◽

Kanako Ueno ◽

Barbara G. Shinn-Cunningham ◽

Norbert Kopčo

Keyword(s):

Feature Analysis ◽

Stop Consonants ◽

Phonetic Feature ◽

Phonetic Categories ◽

Phonetic Features ◽

Manner Of Articulation ◽

Small Advantage

AbstractPurposeWe examined how consonant perception is affected by a preceding speech carrier simulated in the same or a different room, for a broad range of consonants. Carrier room, carrier length, and carrier length/target room uncertainty were manipulated. A phonetic feature analysis tested which phonetic categories are most influenced by the acoustic context of the carrier.MethodTwo experiments were performed, each with 9 participants. Targets consisted of vowel-consonant (VC) syllables presented in one of 2 strongly reverberant rooms, preceded by a VC carrier presented either in the same room, a different reverberant room, or an anechoic room. In Experiment 1 the carrier length and the target room randomly varied from trial to trial while in Experiment 2 they were fixed within blocks of trials.ResultsCompared to the no-carrier condition, a consistent carrier provided only a small advantage for consonant perception, whereas inconsistent carriers disrupted performance significantly. For a different-room carrier, carrier length had an effect; performance dropped significantly in the 2-VC compared to the 4-VC carrier length. The only effect of carrier uncertainty was an overall drop in performance. Phonetic analysis showed that an inconsistent carrier significantly degraded identification of the manner of articulation, especially for stop consonants, and, in one of the rooms, also of voicing.ConclusionsCalibration of consonant perception to strong reverberation is exhibited through disruptions in perception when the room is switched. The strength of calibration varies across different consonants and phonetic features, as well as across rooms and durations of exposure to a given room.

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Pre-Speech in Children with Cleft Lip and Palate or Cleft Palate Only: Phonetic Analysis Related to Morphologic and Functional Factors

The Cleft Palate-Craniofacial Journal ◽

10.1597/1545-1569_1994_031_0271_psicwc_2.3.co_2 ◽

1994 ◽

Vol 31 (4) ◽

pp. 271-279 ◽

Cited By ~ 14

Author(s):

Anette Lohmander-Agerskov ◽

Ewa Söderpalm ◽

Hans Friede ◽

Eva-Carin Persson ◽

Jan Lilja

Keyword(s):

Cleft Palate ◽

Cleft Lip ◽

Cleft Lip And Palate ◽

Surgical Repair ◽

Place Of Articulation ◽

Functional Factors ◽

Phonetic Features ◽

Delayed Closure ◽

Manner Of Articulation ◽

Positive Effect

Pre-speech in 35 children with clefts of the lip and palate or palate only were analyzed for place and manner of articulation. Transcriptions were made from tape recorded babbling sequences. Two children without clefts were used as reference. All of the children with clefts were treated according to a regimen of early surgical repair of the velum cleft and delayed closure of the cleft in the hard palate. The frequency of selected phonetic features was calculated. Correlations between phonetic/perceptual and functional and morphological factors were tested. Supraglottal articulation dominated among all the children Indicating a sufficient velopharyngeal mechanism. The results also showed correlations between cleft type and place of articulation. Anteriorly placed sounds (I.e., bilabial, dental, and alveolar sounds) occurred frequently among the children with cleft palate only and in the noncleft children. In children with cleft lip and palate, posteriorly placed articulations predominated. It was postulated that early intervention may have a positive effect on articulatory development.

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The Treatment of Nasal Elements by Early Arab and Muslim Phoneticians

Historiographia Linguistica ◽

10.1075/hl.8.2-3.05bak ◽

1981 ◽

Vol 8 (2-3) ◽

pp. 285-305

Author(s):

M. H. Bakalla

Keyword(s):

Distinctive Feature ◽

Systematic Approach ◽

Vocal Tract ◽

Feature Analysis ◽

Ibn Sina ◽

Place Of Articulation ◽

Graphic Data ◽

Voiceless Stop ◽

Manner Of Articulation ◽

Modern Arabic

Summary This article attempts to give a summary of the contribution made by early Arabs and Muslims in the field of phonetic sciences. Works by scholars like al-Khalīl (d.175/791), Sībawayhi (d.177/793), Ibn Jinnī (d.392/1002), Ibn Sīnā or Avicenne (d.428/1037) and others will be given special attention in this connection. In particular, it presents the various treatments of the Arabic nasal sounds and the phenomenon of nasalization. As a term of reference, the Arab and Muslim phoneticians divided the Arabic phonemes into categories such as: glottals, pharyngeals, palatals, dentals /l, r, n/, and labials /f, b, m, w/. Al-Khalīl is one of the first Arab phoneticians to order the Arabic phonemes in terms of place of articulation along the vocal tract from the glottis upward to the lips. His student, Sībawayhi, and later phoneticians also recognized other categories in terms of manner of articulation such as: voiced/voiceless, stop/ non-stop, rolled, lateral, nasals/m, n/, including variants, e.g. [ŋ, N]. Further, Sībawayhi and Ibn Jinnī seem to lay more emphasis on treating ghunna or nasality and other features in terms of binary distinctive feature analysis. The Muslim phoneticians also recognized that in certain contexts /n/ and /m/ may influence non-nasals, both vowels and consonants. In sum, a close look at the early Arab grammatical works reveals an underlying systematic approach and a rich mine of terminology which are relevant both to modern Arabic phonetics and general phonetics. Some instrumental (spectographic and mingo-graphic) data are included at the end of the article in order to support some of the descriptive techniques used in early phonetic heritage.

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The sound structure of verb roots in modern Hebrew

Journal of Linguistics ◽

10.1017/s0022226700006733 ◽

1981 ◽

Vol 17 (1) ◽

pp. 11-16 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

H. Morgenbrod ◽

E. Serifi

Keyword(s):

Place Of Articulation ◽

Compound Matrices ◽

Sound Structure ◽

Different Types ◽

Modern Hebrew ◽

Points Of View ◽

Manner Of Articulation ◽

The Relationship

I. SOUNDS IN MODERN HEBREW Hebrew shorashim – the triliteral roots – have already been analysed from many points of view, for example in Morgenbrod & Serifi (1976, 1977, 1978). The aim of this article is an examination of the sound structure of shorashim.In general we can divide the consonants which form the shorashim into two different types; concerning (a) the manner of articulation (e.g. plosives, nasals, etc.); and (b) the place of articulation (e.g. bilabials, labiodentals, etc.).In this study we have concentrated on position of articulation and ignore manner of articulation.In Figure I the consonants forming the shorashim are related to the different kinds of sounds according to Wendt (1961).In order to investigate the relationship between the sounds it is convenient to establish so-called compound matrices with a computer. All computation was done by a program in COBOL running on the SIEMENS System 4004. As material for our analysis we took 2443 shorashim from the sources Barkaly (1972) and Even-Shoshan (1972).

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Classification of place-of-articulation of stop consonants using temporal analysis

10.21437/interspeech.2015-397 ◽

2015 ◽

Author(s):

A. P. Prathosh ◽

A. G. Ramakrishnan ◽

T. V. Ananthapadmanabha

Keyword(s):

Temporal Analysis ◽

Stop Consonants ◽

Place Of Articulation

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Time‐varying features as correlates of place of articulation in stop consonants

The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America ◽

10.1121/1.388813 ◽

1983 ◽

Vol 73 (1) ◽

pp. 322-335 ◽

Cited By ~ 115

Author(s):

Diane Kewley‐Port

Keyword(s):

Time Varying ◽

Stop Consonants ◽

Place Of Articulation

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Genetic and environmental effects in L1 phonological acquisitionThe case of consonant harmony in Greek child speech

Journal of Greek Linguistics ◽

10.1075/jgl.8.04tza ◽

2007 ◽

Vol 8 (1) ◽

pp. 5-30 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Marina Tzakosta

Keyword(s):

Environmental Effects ◽

Input Frequency ◽

Stressed Syllable ◽

Place Of Articulation ◽

Consonant Harmony ◽

Multiple Factors ◽

Greek Child ◽

Ambient Language ◽

Child Speech ◽

Manner Of Articulation

AbstractConsonant harmony (CH) is a phenomenon commonly found in child language. Cross-linguistically, Place of Articulation (PoA), specifically the Coronal Node, undergoes CH, while regressive harmony seems to be the preferred directionality that CH takes (cf. Goad 2001a, b; Levelt 1994; Rose 2000, 2001). In the present study, drawing on naturalistic data from nine children acquiring Greek L1, we place emphasis on the fact that multiple factors need to be considered in parallel, in order to account for CH patterns: Not only PoA, but also Manner of Articulation (MoA) contributes to CH; consequently, (de)voicing or continuity harmony emerges. Although regressive harmony is generally favoured, markedness scales and word stress highly affect directionality. Coronal, stop and voiceless segments trigger and undergo CH depending on their degree of prominence and their position in the word. Harmony can be partial or full, i.e. either place or manner or both place and manner of articulation are targeted. Progressive harmony emerges when the triggers belong to the stressed syllable or when they are stops. Cases of double, bidirectional and recursive harmony are also reported. In general, Greek CH patterns are the product of combined factors determined by phonological principles and input frequency in the ambient language. In other words, the degree to which Greek CH patterns are different from cross-linguistic findings depends on the combination of UG principles and language specific/environmental effects, as well as the prominence of certain of these factors over others.

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Phonetic variation in consonants in infant-directed and adult-directed speech: the case of regressive place assimilation in word-final alveolar stops

Journal of Child Language ◽

10.1017/s0305000912000670 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 41 (1) ◽

pp. 155-175 ◽

Cited By ~ 11

Author(s):

LAURA C. DILLEY ◽

AMANDA L. MILLETT ◽

J. DEVIN MCAULEY ◽

TONYA R. BERGESON

Keyword(s):

Stop Consonants ◽

Age Group ◽

Statistical Distributions ◽

Phonetic Variation ◽

Pronunciation Variation ◽

Place Of Articulation ◽

Place Assimilation ◽

Perceptual Evidence

ABSTRACTPronunciation variation is under-studied in infant-directed speech, particularly for consonants. Regressive place assimilation involves a word-final alveolar stop taking the place of articulation of a following word-initial consonant. We investigated pronunciation variation in word-final alveolar stop consonants in storybooks read by forty-eight mothers in adult-directed or infant-directed style to infants aged approximately 0;3, 0;9, 1;1, or 1;8. We focused on phonological environments where regressive place assimilation could occur, i.e., when the stop preceded a word-initial labial or velar consonant. Spectrogram, waveform, and perceptual evidence was used to classify tokens into four pronunciation categories: canonical, assimilated, glottalized, or deleted. Results showed a reliable tendency for canonical variants to occur in infant-directed speech more often than in adult-directed speech. However, the otherwise very similar distributions of variants across addressee and age group suggested that infants largely experience statistical distributions of non-canonical consonantal pronunciation variants that mirror those experienced by adults.

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