The role of visual speech cues in sound change: A study of the cot-caught contrast among Michigan speakers

2016 ◽  
Vol 140 (4) ◽  
pp. 3219-3219
Author(s):  
Jonathan Havenhill ◽  
Youngah Do
Keyword(s):  
Sound Change ◽  
Visual Speech ◽  
Speech Cues

scholarly journals The Role of Multisensory Temporal Covariation in Audiovisual Speech Recognition in Noise

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan Henry Venezia ◽  
Robert Sandlin ◽  
Leon Wojno ◽  
Anthony Duc Tran ◽  
Gregory Hickok ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Speech Intelligibility ◽  
Visual Speech ◽  
Auditory Signal ◽  
Motion Trajectories ◽  
Speech Cues ◽  
Audiovisual Speech Recognition ◽  
Speech Envelope ◽  
Speech Recognition In Noise

Static and dynamic visual speech cues contribute to audiovisual (AV) speech recognition in noise. Static cues (e.g., “lipreading”) provide complementary information that enables perceivers to ascertain ambiguous acoustic-phonetic content. The role of dynamic cues is less clear, but one suggestion is that temporal covariation between facial motion trajectories and the speech envelope enables perceivers to recover a more robust representation of the time-varying acoustic signal. Modeling studies show this is computationally feasible, though it has not been confirmed experimentally. We conducted two experiments to determine whether AV speech recognition depends on the magnitude of cross-sensory temporal coherence (AVC). In Experiment 1, sentence-keyword recognition in steady-state noise (SSN) was assessed across a range of signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) for auditory and AV speech. The auditory signal was unprocessed or filtered to remove 3-7 Hz temporal modulations. Filtering severely reduced AVC (magnitude-squared coherence of lip trajectories with cochlear-narrowband speech envelopes), but did not reduce the magnitude of the AV advantage (AV > A; ~ 4 dB). This did not depend on the presence of static cues, manipulated via facial blurring. Experiment 2 assessed AV speech recognition in SSN at a fixed SNR (-10.5 dB) for subsets of Exp. 1 stimuli with naturally high or low AVC. A small effect (~ 5% correct; high-AVC > low-AVC) was observed. A computational model of AV speech intelligibility based on AVC yielded good overall predictions of performance, but over-predicted the differential effects of AVC. These results suggest the role and/or computational characterization of AVC must be re-conceptualized.

Auditory and Auditory-Visual Perception of Clear and Conversational Speech

1997 ◽  
Vol 40 (2) ◽  
pp. 432-443 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen S. Helfer
Keyword(s):  
Visual Cues ◽  
Presentation Mode ◽  
Visual Presentation ◽  
Visual Speech ◽  
Conversational Speech ◽  
Clear Speech ◽  
Nature Of Information ◽  
Speech Cues ◽  
Visual Speech Information ◽  
Speech Information

Research has shown that speaking in a deliberately clear manner can improve the accuracy of auditory speech recognition. Allowing listeners access to visual speech cues also enhances speech understanding. Whether the nature of information provided by speaking clearly and by using visual speech cues is redundant has not been determined. This study examined how speaking mode (clear vs. conversational) and presentation mode (auditory vs. auditory-visual) influenced the perception of words within nonsense sentences. In Experiment 1, 30 young listeners with normal hearing responded to videotaped stimuli presented audiovisually in the presence of background noise at one of three signal-to-noise ratios. In Experiment 2, 9 participants returned for an additional assessment using auditory-only presentation. Results of these experiments showed significant effects of speaking mode (clear speech was easier to understand than was conversational speech) and presentation mode (auditoryvisual presentation led to better performance than did auditory-only presentation). The benefit of clear speech was greater for words occurring in the middle of sentences than for words at either the beginning or end of sentences for both auditory-only and auditory-visual presentation, whereas the greatest benefit from supplying visual cues was for words at the end of sentences spoken both clearly and conversationally. The total benefit from speaking clearly and supplying visual cues was equal to the sum of each of these effects. Overall, the results suggest that speaking clearly and providing visual speech information provide complementary (rather than redundant) information.

scholarly journals An experimental study of the role of social factors in language change: The case of loanword adaptations

2014 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Shiri Lev-Ari ◽  
Sharon Peperkamp
Keyword(s):  
Experimental Study ◽  
Social Factors ◽  
Language Change ◽  
Sound Change ◽  
Experimental Setting ◽  
Experimental Paradigm ◽  
Semantic Domain ◽  
The Creation

AbstractThere is great variation in whether foreign sounds in loanwords are adapted or retained. Importantly, the retention of foreign sounds can lead to a sound change in the language. We propose that social factors influence the likelihood of loanword sound adaptation, and use this case to introduce a novel experimental paradigm for studying language change that captures the role of social factors. Specifically, we show that the relative prestige of the donor language in the loanword’s semantic domain influences the rate of sound adaptation. We further show that speakers adapt to the performance of their ‘community', and that this adaptation leads to the creation of a norm. The results of this study are thus the first to show an effect of social factors on loanword sound adaptation in an experimental setting. Moreover, they open up a new domain of experimentally studying language change in a manner that integrates social factors.

scholarly journals Sound Change and Grammaticalization in Japanese Verb Morphology

1996 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 429
Author(s):  
Natasha Warner
Keyword(s):  
Annual Meeting ◽  
Sound Change ◽  
General Session ◽  
Verb Morphology

Proceedings of the Twenty-Second Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society: General Session and Parasession on The Role of Learnability in Grammatical Theory (1996)

scholarly journals The Role of Auditory and Visual Speech in Word Learning at 18 Months and in Adulthood

2017 ◽  
Vol 88 (6) ◽  
pp. 2043-2059 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mélanie Havy ◽  
Afra Foroud ◽  
Laurel Fais ◽  
Janet F. Werker
Keyword(s):  
Word Learning ◽  
Visual Speech

The role of educational factors in the development of lexical splits

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 36-72
Author(s):  
Yuhan Lin
Keyword(s):  
Education System ◽  
Social Factors ◽  
Sound Change ◽  
Previous Literature ◽  
Official Language ◽  
Time Analysis ◽  
Sound Changes ◽  
Potential Factors ◽  
Statistical Results

Abstract While variationist literature on sound change has mostly focused on chain shifts and mergers, much less is written about splits (Labov, 1994, 2010). Previous literature shows that the acquisition of splits is unlikely unless motivated by social factors (Labov, 1994). The current study presents an apparent time analysis on the development of two phonemic splits, the initial /s/-/ʂ/ contrast and the initial /ɻ/-/l/ contrast, in Xiamen Mandarin, a contact variety of Putonghua, the official language in China. Statistical results showed similar patterns for both variables: younger speakers and female speakers are leading the change; the distinction between two phonemes are more distinct in wordlist than in the sociolinguistic interview. By examining the sociolinguistic situation in Xiamen, the paper discusses two potential factors that have led to these sound changes: the regional campaign for Putonghua and the emphasis of Pinyin, a phonetically-based orthography, in the education system.

The adaptation of French liquids in Haitian

2018 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
pp. 386-410
Author(s):  
Benjamin Storme
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Second Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Sound Change ◽  
Loanword Adaptation ◽  
Perceptual Asymmetry ◽  
The Way

Abstract Haitian, a French-lexifier creole with a Gbe substrate, shows an asymmetry in the way it has adapted French liquids: the French lateral was maintained in postvocalic coda position in Haitian, but the French rhotic was systematically deleted in this position. This paper presents the results of a perception study showing that the lateral is generally more perceptible than the rhotic in coda position in Modern French. The hypothesis that perception played a role in the phonological asymmetry in Haitian is compatible with these results. The paper sketches an analysis of how the perceptual asymmetry between French coda laterals and rhotics resulted in the emergence of a new phonological grammar, distinct from both the grammar of the substrate and superstrate languages. This analysis is in line with previous works on the role of perception in second language acquisition, loanword adaptation, creolization, and sound change more generally.

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