Planning units in speech production

2013 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 253-275
Author(s):  
Chihsia Tang
Keyword(s):  
Speech Production ◽  
Mandarin Chinese ◽  
Speech Processing ◽  
Narrative Discourse ◽  
Processing Unit ◽  
The Status ◽  
Speech Planning ◽  
Mandarin Speakers

Previous studies based on observations of different languages have shown that phrase is the integral unit of speech formulation and articulation. Evidence from Mandarin Chinese, however, is scant. This research, therefore, sets out to explore whether the speech processing unit of Chinese spoken communication resembles that of other languages by examining its anticipatory retracing configurations in repair-related discourse. Results show that when doing repairs with the initiation strategy of speech retracing, speakers consistently return to various phrasal unit boundaries in the original utterances to restore their suspended articulations, showing that Mandarin speakers indeed organize narrative discourse on the basis of phrasal constituents. Based on the results of the present research, mental capacities of the speakers are deemed to have an impact on the syntactic scopes of anticipatory retracings in reconstructed speeches. This study thus contributes to the literature on units of speech planning from a typologically different language and raises questions about the status of the phrase in Mandarin grammar.

Grammatik der Narration

2020 ◽  
Vol 48 (3) ◽  
pp. 457-494
Author(s):  
Sonja Zeman
Keyword(s):  
Narrative Discourse ◽  
Linguistic Theory ◽  
Second Step ◽  
Narrative Fiction ◽  
The Status ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Narrative Syntax

AbstractIs there a ‚narrative syntax‘, i. e. a special grammar restricted to narrative fiction? Starting from this question which has been investigated since early structuralism, the paper focusses on grammatical characteristics of narrative discourse mode and their implications for a linguistic theory of narration. Its goal is two-fold: In a first step, the traditional accounts by Benveniste, Hamburger, Kuroda and recent typological studies are brought together in order to support the claim that the distinction between narrative and non-narrative discourse mode is a fundamental one that has consequences for the use of grammar. In a second step, I discuss three central questions within the intersection between narrative micro- and macro-structures, namely (i) the definition of narrativity, (ii) the status of the narrator, and (iii) the relation between narration and fictionality. In sum, the article argues that investigations on the ‘grammar of narration’ do not just offer insights into a specific text configuration next to others, but are deeply linked to fundamental theoretical questions concerning the architecture of language – and that the comparison between linguistic and narratological categories offers a potential for addressing them.

He who Hesitates: Hesitation Phenomena as Quality Control in Speech Production, Obstacles in Non-Native Speech Perception

2000 ◽  
Vol 182 (3) ◽  
pp. 72-97 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marnie Reed
Keyword(s):  
Quality Control ◽  
Speech Production ◽  
Speech Processing ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Classification Framework ◽  
Native Speech ◽  
Control Devices ◽  
Content Processing ◽  
Hesitation Phenomena

This study was designed to determine the nature and occurrence of hesitation phenomena in spontaneous speech of native and non-native speakers, and to determine whether and to what extent the hesitation phenomena normal in spontaneous speech pose perception problems for non-native speakers. A quantitative analysis reveals that hesitation phenomena are ubiquitous in both native and non-native speech production. A qualitative analysis based on a content-processing classification framework reveals the function of hesitations. Hesitations act as overt traces of prospective and retrospective speech-processing tasks which function to forestall errors, and to permit detection and repair of errors once they are committed. Hesitations are quality control devices; native and non-native speakers are highly successful utilizing them to forestall errors. However, hesitation phenomena clearly pose perception problems for non-native speakers who show little evidence of recognizing them as such. Like native speakers, non-native speakers produce hesitation phenomena. Unlike native speakers, who edit and filter out the hesitations they hear, non-native speakers attempt to assign meaning to speakers' faulty output or to parenthetical remarks. Hesitations are unpredictable in their frequency or occurrence; failure to provide training in these oral discourse features of connected speech may result in non-native speakers whose speech production vastly outstrips their perception.

scholarly journals The Mechanism of Speech Processing in Congenital Amusia: Evidence from Mandarin Speakers

PLoS ONE ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. e30374 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fang Liu ◽  
Cunmei Jiang ◽  
William Forde Thompson ◽  
Yi Xu ◽  
Yufang Yang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Speech Processing ◽  
Congenital Amusia ◽  
Mandarin Speakers

scholarly journals Conflict monitoring in speech processing: An fMRI study of error detection in speech production and perception

NeuroImage ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 126 ◽  
pp. 96-105 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hanna S. Gauvin ◽  
Wouter De Baene ◽  
Marcel Brass ◽  
Robert J. Hartsuiker
Keyword(s):  
Speech Production ◽  
Error Detection ◽  
Speech Processing ◽  
Conflict Monitoring ◽  
Fmri Study

scholarly journals Development of Velopharyngeal Closure for Vocalization During the First 2 Years of Life

2018 ◽  
Vol 61 (3) ◽  
pp. 549-560 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kate Bunton ◽  
Jeannette D. Hoit
Keyword(s):  
Speech Production ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Sex Effects ◽  
Young Infants ◽  
Oral Pressure ◽  
Ram Pressure ◽  
Velopharyngeal Closure ◽  
The Status ◽  
Sound Category

PurposeThe vocalizations of young infants often sound nasalized, suggesting that the velopharynx is open during the 1st few months of life. Whereas acoustic and perceptual studies seemed to support the idea that the velopharynx closes for vocalization by about 4 months of age, an aeromechanical study contradicted this (Thom, Hoit, Hixon, & Smith, 2006). Thus, the current large-scale investigation was undertaken to determine when the velopharynx closes for speech production by following infants during their first 2 years of life.MethodThis longitudinal study used nasal ram pressure to determine the status of the velopharynx (open or closed) during spontaneous speech production in 92 participants (46 male, 46 female) studied monthly from age 4 to 24 months.ResultsThe velopharynx was closed during at least 90% of the utterances by 19 months, though there was substantial variability across participants. When considered by sound category, the velopharynx was closed from most to least often during production of oral obstruents, approximants, vowels (only), and glottal obstruents. No sex effects were observed.ConclusionVelopharyngeal closure for spontaneous speech production can be considered complete by 19 months, but closure occurs earlier for speech sounds with higher oral pressure demands.

scholarly journals Scaling and universality in the human voice

2015 ◽  
Vol 12 (105) ◽  
pp. 20141344 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jordi Luque ◽  
Bartolo Luque ◽  
Lucas Lacasa
Keyword(s):  
Speech Production ◽  
Power Law ◽  
Speech Processing ◽  
Speech Synthesis ◽  
Deterministic Chaos ◽  
Scale Invariant ◽  
Human Capabilities ◽  
Human Speech ◽  
Temporal Correlations ◽  
Low Dimensional

Speech is a distinctive complex feature of human capabilities. In order to understand the physics underlying speech production, in this work, we empirically analyse the statistics of large human speech datasets ranging several languages. We first show that during speech, the energy is unevenly released and power-law distributed, reporting a universal robust Gutenberg–Richter-like law in speech. We further show that such ‘earthquakes in speech’ show temporal correlations, as the interevent statistics are again power-law distributed. As this feature takes place in the intraphoneme range, we conjecture that the process responsible for this complex phenomenon is not cognitive, but it resides in the physiological (mechanical) mechanisms of speech production. Moreover, we show that these waiting time distributions are scale invariant under a renormalization group transformation, suggesting that the process of speech generation is indeed operating close to a critical point. These results are put in contrast with current paradigms in speech processing, which point towards low dimensional deterministic chaos as the origin of nonlinear traits in speech fluctuations. As these latter fluctuations are indeed the aspects that humanize synthetic speech, these findings may have an impact in future speech synthesis technologies. Results are robust and independent of the communication language or the number of speakers, pointing towards a universal pattern and yet another hint of complexity in human speech.

Classifiers augment and maintain shape-based categorization in Mandarin speakers

2013 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria D. Sera ◽  
Kaitlin R. Johnson ◽  
Jenny Yichun Kuo
Keyword(s):  
Mandarin Chinese ◽  
Word Learning ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
English Speakers ◽  
Shape Bias ◽  
Solid Objects ◽  
Mandarin Speakers ◽  
Chinese Classifiers

AbstractPast evidence suggests that adult Mandarin speakers rely on shape more heavily than English speakers when categorizing solid objects (Kuo and Sera 2009). In this experiment, we began to examine that effect developmentally by investigating the acquisition of the three most common Mandarin Chinese classifiers for solid objects (i.e. ge, zhi and tiao) in relation to development in shape-based categorization by native speakers of Mandarin and English from 3 years of age to adulthood. We found that 3-year-old Mandarin speakers were above chance in their classifier knowledge, but this knowledge continued to develop through 7 years of age. We also found that Mandarin speakers relied more heavily on shape than English speakers, and that shape-based categorization among English speakers tended to decline with age on the trials in which shape choices matched the Mandarin classifiers. The findings suggest that classifiers initially augment Mandarin speakers' attention to the shape of solid objects, and then maintain this early stronger shape bias after they are fully learned. The work highlights how categorization and word learning are graded and intertwined.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document