Differential effects of speaking rate and phonemic vowel length on formant frequencies of Japanese vowels

Purpose The primary purpose of this study was to determine the strength of interspeaker and intraspeaker articulatory-to-acoustic relations of vowel contrast produced by talkers with dysarthria and controls. Methods Six talkers with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), six talkers with Parkinson's disease (PD), and 12 controls repeated a sentence at typical, slow, and fast rates. Tongue displacements and acoustic vowel distances were measured to determine articulatory and acoustic vowel contrasts. Results Interspeaker articulatory-to-acoustic relations were strong for talkers with PD and controls but weak for talkers with ALS and controls. Further, predominantly moderate and strong intraspeaker articulatory-to-acoustic relations were found in response to rate modulations; however, correlation coefficients were significantly lower in talkers with ALS than in controls. Conclusions The findings on interspeaker articulatory-to-acoustic relations suggested that the degree of tongue displacement can be accurately inferred from the degree of acoustic vowel contrast in talkers with PD but not in talkers with ALS. Findings on intraspeaker articulatory-to-acoustic relations generally supported the longstanding notion that speaking rate–induced changes in tongue displacement evoke similar changes in acoustic vowel contrast. Differential effects of the pathophysiology on inter- and intraspeaker articulatory-to-acoustic relations are discussed.

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Effects of speaking rate on the vowel length distinction in Korean

The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America ◽

10.1121/1.2029507 ◽

1991 ◽

Vol 89 (4B) ◽

pp. 1918-1918 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Harriet S. Magen ◽

Sheila E. Blumstein

Keyword(s):

Speaking Rate ◽

Vowel Length

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The effect of speaking‐rate manipulations on segment durations and formant frequencies in dysarthric speakers with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis

The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America ◽

10.1121/1.420473 ◽

1997 ◽

Vol 102 (5) ◽

pp. 3094-3094

Author(s):

Jacqueline S. Laures ◽

Jing‐Yi Jeng

Keyword(s):

Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis ◽

Speaking Rate ◽

Formant Frequencies ◽

Lateral Sclerosis

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Thai Rate-Varied Vowel Length Perception and the Impact of Musical Experience

Language and Speech ◽

10.1177/0023830916642489 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 60 (1) ◽

pp. 65-84 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Angela Cooper ◽

Yue Wang ◽

Richard Ashley

Keyword(s):

Significant Role ◽

Temporal Information ◽

Speaking Rate ◽

Musical Experience ◽

Vowel Length ◽

Length Perception ◽

Native Speech ◽

The Impact ◽

Phonemic Contrasts

Musical experience has been demonstrated to play a significant role in the perception of non-native speech contrasts. The present study examined whether or not musical experience facilitated the normalization of speaking rate in the perception of non-native phonemic vowel length contrasts. Native English musicians and non-musicians (as well as native Thai control listeners) completed identification and AX (same–different) discrimination tasks with Thai vowels contrasting in phonemic length at three speaking rates. Results revealed facilitative effects of musical experience in the perception of Thai vowel length categories. Specifically, the English musicians patterned similarly to the native Thai listeners, demonstrating higher accuracy at identifying and discriminating between-category vowel length distinctions than at discriminating within-category durational differences due to speaking rate variations. The English musicians also outperformed non-musicians at between-category vowel length discriminations across speaking rates, indicating musicians’ superiority in perceiving categorical phonemic length differences. These results suggest that musicians’ attunement to rhythmic and temporal information in music transferred to facilitating their ability to normalize contextual quantitative variations (due to speaking rate) and perceive non-native temporal phonemic contrasts.

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Acoustic properties of vowels in Upper Necaxa Totonac

Journal of the International Phonetic Association ◽

10.1017/s0025100318000439 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 1-20

Author(s):

Michelle García-Vega ◽

Benjamin V. Tucker

Keyword(s):

Acoustic Analysis ◽

Native Speakers ◽

River Valley ◽

Acoustic Properties ◽

Vowel Quality ◽

Vowel Length ◽

Acoustic Characteristics ◽

Acoustic Data ◽

Formant Frequencies ◽

Second Formant

Upper Necaxa Totonac is a Totonacan language spoken in the Necaxa River valley in the Sierra Norte of Puebla State, Mexico. While the Totonacan languages historically have three phonemic vowel qualities, the Upper Necaxa system consists of five vowels that contrast length and laryngealization. With acoustic data from six native speakers from the Totonacan communities of Patla and Chicontla, we explore the phonetic properties of vowels with respect to the first and second formant frequencies, quantity (duration), vowel phonation (modal vs. laryngeal), and stress. The data indicate that long, short, modal and laryngeal vowels occupy a similar formant space and that duration is the primary phonetic correlate of phonemic vowel length. A shift in vowel quality and an increase in duration and pitch were shown to be the acoustic characteristics of stress. The study provides a first acoustic analysis of vowels in Upper Necaxa, and contributes to typological descriptions of the properties of vowels connected with quality, quantity, stress, and phonation.

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