Context Matters for Tone and Intonation Processing in Mandarin

2021 ◽  
pp. 002383092098617
Author(s):  
Min Liu ◽  
Yiya Chen ◽  
Niels O. Schiller
Keyword(s):  
Semantic Context ◽  
Final Position ◽  
Lexical Tone ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Neutral Context ◽  
Perceptual Asymmetry ◽  
Overall Performance ◽  
Question Intonation ◽  
Better Than

In tonal languages such as Mandarin, both lexical tone and sentence intonation are primarily signaled by F0. Their F0 encodings are sometimes in conflict and sometimes in congruency. The present study investigated how tone and intonation, with F0 encodings in conflict or in congruency, are processed and how semantic context may affect their processing. To this end, tone and intonation identification experiments were conducted in both semantically neutral and constraining contexts. Results showed that the overall performance of tone identification was better than that of intonation. Specifically, tone identification was seldom affected by intonation information irrespective of semantic contexts. However, intonation identification, particularly question intonation, was susceptible to the final lexical tone identity and affected by the semantic context. In the semantically neutral context, questions ending with a rising tone and a falling tone were equally difficult to identify. In the semantically constraining context, questions ending with a falling tone were much better identified than those ending with a rising tone. This perceptual asymmetry suggests that top-down information provided by the semantically constraining context can play a facilitating role for listeners to disentangle intonational information from tonal information, but mainly in sentences with the lexical falling tone in the final position.

INOVASI FONOLOGIS DENASALISASI DALAM ISOLEK BONAI ULAKPATIAN

2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 235
Author(s):  
Yanti Riswara
Keyword(s):  
Historical Linguistic ◽  
Language Variation ◽  
Final Position ◽  
Process Data ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Linguistic Study ◽  
Oral Speech ◽  
Research Findings

The paper is aimed at describing a language variation, that is Ulakpatian Bonai isolect  in Riau Province. This is a kind of historical linguistic study which  is objected to describe a phonological inovation process of denasalisation among nasal phonemes at final positions or at close ultimate sillables in an isolect used by Bonai tribe in Ulakpatian, Rokan Hulu District,  Riau  Province.  Analysis  of  inavation is based on protomalayic (PM)  which  is reconstructed by Adelaar.The research applicates  top-down method of anaysis which are gaining  the  results by deductive process. Data of  this  research are oral  speech of Bonai people  based  on  200  Swadesh  words.  The  data  are  gathered  by  conversational  and listening  methods  which  applied  several  techniques.  The  results  of  the  analysis  are presented by formal and informal methods. The research findings reveal that the language of the tribe shows three kinds of denasalisation of phonological innovation at final position which  have  changed  the  nasal  phonemes  of  *PM  to  unnasal  ones  in  isolek  Bonai Ulakpatian: (*PM > BU) , i.e. 1) PM *n/-# > []/-#, 2) PM *m/-# > [p]/-#, dan 3) PM * /-# > [g]/-#.Abstrak  Makalah ini bertujuan untuk mendeskripsikan sebuah variasi bahasa, yaitu isolek Bonai Ulakpatian yang terdapat di Provinsi Riau. Kajian ini merupakan kajian linguistik historis yang memaparkan proses inovasi fonologis denasalisasi yang terjadi pada fonem-fonem nasal yang berada pada posisi akhir atau silabe ultima tertutup dalam sebuah isolek yang digunakan oleh suku Bonai di Desa Ulakpatian, Kabupaten Rokan Hulu. Analisis inovasi fonologis tersebut didasarkan pada protomalayik (PM) yang direkonstruksi oleh Adelaar. Kajian ini menerapkan mentode analisis top-down yang bersifat deduktif. Data penelitian merupakan data tuturan masyarakat suku Bonai yang mengacu pada 200 kosakata dasar yang dijadikan rujukan dalam penjaringan data kebahasaan. Data dikumpulkan dengan penerapan metode cakap dan metode simak dengan menggunakan teknik pancing dan teknik rekam. Data dideskripsikan secara fonetis dengan simbol IPA. Hasil penelitian disajikan dengan metode formal dan informal. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa isolek Bonai Ulakpatian memiliki tiga bentuk inovasi fonologis denasalisasi pada posisi akhir beberapa fonem nasal *PM menjadi taknasal pada isolek BU (*PM > BU) , yaitu 1) PM *n/-# > []/-#, 2) PM *m/-# > [p]/-#, dan 3) PM * /-# > [g]/-#.

scholarly journals Performance Evaluation of IMERG GPM Products during Tropical Storm Imelda

Atmosphere ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (6) ◽  
pp. 687
Author(s):  
Salman Sakib ◽  
Dawit Ghebreyesus ◽  
Hatim O. Sharif
Keyword(s):  
Stage Iv ◽  
Tropical Storm ◽  
Average Correlation ◽  
Acceptable Range ◽  
Precipitation Estimates ◽  
Overall Performance ◽  
Early Late ◽  
Statistical Metrics ◽  
Better Than

Tropical Storm Imelda struck the southeast coastal regions of Texas from 17–19 September, 2019, and delivered precipitation above 500 mm over about 6000 km2. The performance of the three IMERG (Early-, Late-, and Final-run) GPM satellite-based precipitation products was evaluated against Stage-IV radar precipitation estimates. Basic and probabilistic statistical metrics, such as CC, RSME, RBIAS, POD, FAR, CSI, and PSS were employed to assess the performance of the IMERG products. The products captured the event adequately, with a fairly high POD value of 0.9. The best product (Early-run) showed an average correlation coefficient of 0.60. The algorithm used to produce the Final-run improved the quality of the data by removing systematic errors that occurred in the near-real-time products. Less than 5 mm RMSE error was experienced in over three-quarters (ranging from 73% to 76%) of the area by all three IMERG products in estimating the Tropical Storm Imelda. The Early-run product showed a much better RBIAS relatively to the Final-run product. The overall performance was poor, as areas with an acceptable range of RBIAS (i.e., between −10% and 10%) in all the three IMERG products were only 16% to 17% of the total area. Overall, the Early-run product was found to be better than Late- and Final-run.

Perception of Word Junctures by Children

1995 ◽  
Vol 80 (3_suppl) ◽  
pp. 1075-1082 ◽  
Author(s):  
Salvatore De Marco ◽  
Roxanne M. Harrell
Keyword(s):  
Age Groups ◽  
Relative Magnitude ◽  
Young Group ◽  
Sentence Context ◽  
Linguistic Context ◽  
Top Down ◽  
School Aged Children ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
Meaningful Context ◽  
Better Than

A comparative study was undertaken to assess the relative magnitude of the effects of linguistic context on the perception of word-juncture boundaries in 30 young school-aged children, 30 older school-aged children, and 30 adults. Minimally contrasted two-word phrases differing in word-juncture boundaries were embedded in a meaningful sentence context, nonmeaningful sentence context, and in neutral phrase context. Groups performed similarly in the neutral phrase context, and two older groups performed better than the young group in the meaningful context. The poorest performances occurred during the nonmeaningful context, with a significant difference among age groups. Heavier reliance upon top-down processing and less developed linguistic and metalinguistic competence may account for the observed differences among groups.

The intonation of wh-questions in Franco-Ontarian

1973 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 89-101
Author(s):  
Renée Baligand ◽  
Eric James
Keyword(s):  
Fundamental Frequency ◽  
Word Order ◽  
Final Position ◽  
Important Research ◽  
Grammatical Structure ◽  
Canadian French ◽  
Wh Questions ◽  
Interrogative Sentence ◽  
Question Intonation

The melodic structure of an interrogative utterance frequently depends on the grammatical structure of the sentence in question. In addition to the enunciative sentence of the kind vous venez? which bears a particular acoustic mark of interrogation, a rise in fundamental frequency in sentence-final position, there exist also interrogative utterances signalled by inversion of word order and still others marked by lexical means, the WH-questions. It is the intonation of this latter type of sentence which we intend to examine in the Canadian-French spoken in Ontario.The intonation of interrogative sentences has for some years been the object of important research in different languages. Wells (1945) and Trager and Smith (1951) note in English an intonation curve at the following levels: 2 - 3 - 1 - without any tonal prominence on the interrogative word. Armstrong and Ward (1926), Jones (1932) and Faure (1948) also find that this type of interrogative sentence has a descending intonation. Fries (1964) finds no specific intonation pattern in a spontaneous corpus from which he studied yes-no questions. For German, Von Essen (1956) notes two intonation patterns: one rising (question intonation) and one falling (interrogative intonation).

scholarly journals How can expert knowledge increase the realism of conceptual hydrological models? A case study based on the concept of dominant runoff process in the Swiss Pre-Alps

2018 ◽  
Vol 22 (8) ◽  
pp. 4425-4447 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manuel Antonetti ◽  
Massimiliano Zappa
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Distribution ◽  
Expert Knowledge ◽  
Hydrological Models ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Bottom Up ◽  
Process Maps ◽  
Uncertainty Sources ◽  
Simulation Results ◽  
Set Up ◽  
Better Than

Abstract. Both modellers and experimentalists agree that using expert knowledge can improve the realism of conceptual hydrological models. However, their use of expert knowledge differs for each step in the modelling procedure, which involves hydrologically mapping the dominant runoff processes (DRPs) occurring on a given catchment, parameterising these processes within a model, and allocating its parameters. Modellers generally use very simplified mapping approaches, applying their knowledge in constraining the model by defining parameter and process relational rules. In contrast, experimentalists usually prefer to invest all their detailed and qualitative knowledge about processes in obtaining as realistic spatial distribution of DRPs as possible, and in defining narrow value ranges for each model parameter.Runoff simulations are affected by equifinality and numerous other uncertainty sources, which challenge the assumption that the more expert knowledge is used, the better will be the results obtained. To test for the extent to which expert knowledge can improve simulation results under uncertainty, we therefore applied a total of 60 modelling chain combinations forced by five rainfall datasets of increasing accuracy to four nested catchments in the Swiss Pre-Alps. These datasets include hourly precipitation data from automatic stations interpolated with Thiessen polygons and with the inverse distance weighting (IDW) method, as well as different spatial aggregations of Combiprecip, a combination between ground measurements and radar quantitative estimations of precipitation. To map the spatial distribution of the DRPs, three mapping approaches with different levels of involvement of expert knowledge were used to derive so-called process maps. Finally, both a typical modellers' top-down set-up relying on parameter and process constraints and an experimentalists' set-up based on bottom-up thinking and on field expertise were implemented using a newly developed process-based runoff generation module (RGM-PRO). To quantify the uncertainty originating from forcing data, process maps, model parameterisation, and parameter allocation strategy, an analysis of variance (ANOVA) was performed.The simulation results showed that (i) the modelling chains based on the most complex process maps performed slightly better than those based on less expert knowledge; (ii) the bottom-up set-up performed better than the top-down one when simulating short-duration events, but similarly to the top-down set-up when simulating long-duration events; (iii) the differences in performance arising from the different forcing data were due to compensation effects; and (iv) the bottom-up set-up can help identify uncertainty sources, but is prone to overconfidence problems, whereas the top-down set-up seems to accommodate uncertainties in the input data best. Overall, modellers' and experimentalists' concept of model realism differ. This means that the level of detail a model should have to accurately reproduce the DRPs expected must be agreed in advance.

scholarly journals Speech Perception through Face Masks by Children and Adults

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julia Schwarz ◽  
Katrina (Kechun) Li ◽  
Jasper Hong Sim ◽  
Yixin Zhang ◽  
Elizabeth Buchanan-Worster ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Speech Perception ◽  
Acoustic Signal ◽  
Speech Processing ◽  
Face Mask ◽  
Semantic Context ◽  
Final Position ◽  
Semantic Cues ◽  
Visual Obstruction ◽  
First Results ◽  
Processing Language

Face masks can cause speech processing difficulties. However, it is unclear to what extent these difficulties are caused by the visual obstruction of the speaker’s mouth or by changes of the acoustic signal, and whether the effects can be found regardless of semantic context. In the present study, children and adults performed a cued shadowing task online, repeating the last word of English sentences. Target words were embedded in sentence-final position and manipulated visually, acoustically, and by semantic context (cloze probability). First results from 16 children and 16 adults suggest that processing language through face masks leads to slower responses in both groups, but visual, acoustic, and semantic cues all significantly reduce the mask effect. Although children were less proficient in predictive speech processing overall, they were still able to use semantic cues to compensate for face mask effects in a similar fashion to adults.

scholarly journals Impact Of Genotypes And Parity On Reproductive And Productive Attributes In Dairy Cattle Of Natore District, Bangladesh

1970 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
pp. 91-96
Author(s):  
M Saiful Islam ◽  
Susanta Kumar Kundu
Keyword(s):  
Dairy Cattle ◽  
Dairy Cows ◽  
Milk Yield ◽  
Dairy Farms ◽  
Gestation Length ◽  
Overall Performance ◽  
Daily Milk Yield ◽  
Better Than ◽  
Daily Milk ◽  
Smallholder Dairy Farms

Impact of genotypes and parity on some vital reproductive and productive attributes in the local (L×L, n = 100) and four crossbred cows (L×F, L×SL, L×JR and L×S; n = 318) raised in randomly selected smallholder dairy farms scattered all over Natore District and adjacent areas have been assessed during a period from September 2007 to June 2010. With regard to reproductive attributes, significant differences existed among the cattle genotypes (P<0.05) except for gestation length (GL) and age at weaning (AW). The lowest age at puberty (AP) was found for L×F (21.42±0.37 months), while the highest for L×L (31.67±0.74 months). In terms of productivity, L×F cows produced the highest daily milk yield (DMY; 6.22±0.13 L), coupled with the highest total lactation yield (TLY; 2163.43±47.77 L), while L×L produced the lowest values (1.49±0.04 L and 416.40±12.3 L, respectively) for the traits. The effect of parity on both reproductive and productive attributes showed that the middle-aged dairy cows of the 3rd and 4th parities performed better than the younger (1st and 2nd parities) or the older (5th and beyond) ones. Considering the overall performance, the L×F cows could be ranked as the best genotype followed by their L×SL, L×JR, L×S and L×L counterparts in the study area. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3329/jles.v6i0.9727 JLES 2011 6: 91-96

scholarly journals Enhancement the stability of power system using optimal location of FACTS devices

2020 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 648
Author(s):  
Ali Najim Abdullah ◽  
Ahmed Majeed Ghadhban ◽  
Hayder Salim Hameed ◽  
Husham Idan Hussein
Keyword(s):  
Power Network ◽  
Performance Factors ◽  
Facts Devices ◽  
Clearing Time ◽  
Thyristor Controlled Series Capacitor ◽  
Overall Performance ◽  
Set Up ◽  
The Stability ◽  
And Control ◽  
Better Than

<p><span>This paper proposes a steady-state of the Static Var Compensator (SVC) &amp; Thyristor Controlled Series Capacitor (TCSC) set up for enhancing the damping overall performance and growing the integral clearing time (CCT) of a power network. The indispensable clearing time is carried out through increasing the time fault interval until the gadget loses stability. Increasing the CCT can be contribute to reliability of the safety gadget, decrease the protection machine ranking and cost. In order to attain most enhancement of machine stability via optimizing location, sizing and control modes of SVC and TCSC. Models and methodology for putting and designing shunt FACT’s units SVC (injected reactive strength Q) and series FACT’s devices TCSC (chose capacitive region) are examined in a 6-bus system. Performance factors are described to show validation of SVC and TCSC on extraordinary conditions. It is proven that the SVC is better than TCSC. </span></p>

Multi-Objective Evolutionary Algorithm Based on Two Reference Points Decomposition and Historical Information Prediction

2021 ◽  
Vol 01 ◽  
Author(s):  
Er-chao Li ◽  
Kang-wei Li
Keyword(s):  
Evolutionary Algorithm ◽  
Optimization Problems ◽  
Reference Points ◽  
Multi Objective Optimization ◽  
Test Function ◽  
Historical Information ◽  
Multi Objective ◽  
Nadir Point ◽  
Overall Performance ◽  
Better Than

Aims: The main purpose of this paper is to solve the issues that the poor quality of offspring solutions generated by traditional evolutionary operators, and that the inability of the evolutionary algorithm based on decomposition to better solve the multi-objective optimization problems (MOPs) with complicated Pareto fronts (PFs). Background: For some complicated multi-objective optimization problems, the effect of the multi-objective evolutionary algorithm based on decomposition (MOEA/D) is poor. For specific complicated problems, there is less research on improving the algorithm's performance by setting and adjusting the direction vector in the decomposition-based evolutionary algorithm. And considering that in the existing algorithms, the optimal solutions are selected according to the selection strategy in the selection stage, without considering if it could produce the better solutions in the stage of individual generation to achieve the optimization effect faster. As a result of these, a multi-objective evolutionary algorithm that is based on two reference points decomposition and historical information prediction is proposed. Objective: In order to verify the feasibility of the proposed strategy, the F-series test function with complicated PFs is used as the test function to simulate the proposed strategy. Method: Firstly, the evolutionary operator based on Historical Information Prediction (EHIP) is used to generate better offspring solutions to improve the convergence of the algorithm; secondly, the decomposition strategy based on ideal point and nadir point is used to select solutions to solve the MOPs with complicated PFs, and the decomposition method with augmentation term is used to improve the population diversity when selecting solutions according to the nadir point. Finally, the proposed algorithm is compared to several popular algorithms by the F-series test function, and the comparison is made according to the corresponding performance metrics. Result: The performance of the algorithm is improved obviously compared with the popular algorithms after using the EHIP. When the decomposition method with augmentation term is added, the performance of the proposed algorithm is better than the algorithm with only the EHIP on the whole. However, the overall performance is better than the popular algorithms. Conclusion and Prospect: The experimental results show that the overall performance of the proposed algorithm is superior to the popular algorithms. The EHIP can produce better quality offspring solutions, and the decomposition strategy based on two reference points can well solve the MOPs with complicated PFs. This paper mainly demonstrates the theory without testing the practical problems. The following research mainly focuses on the application of the proposed algorithm to the practical problems such as robot path planning.

scholarly journals Specialization and Performance: Evidence from NCAA 4 × 400 m Relay Times

Economies ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 96
Author(s):  
Candon Johnson ◽  
Robert Schultz ◽  
Joshua C. Hall
Keyword(s):  
Performance Measure ◽  
Division I ◽  
Division Iii ◽  
Overall Performance ◽  
The Difference ◽  
And Performance ◽  
Using Data ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Better Than

This paper investigates the impact of having open 400 meter (400 m) runners on NCAA relay teams. Using data from 2012–2016 containing the top 100 4 × 400 m in each NCAA Division relay times for each year, it is found that more 400 m specialists lead to an increase in the overall performance of the team, measured by a decrease in relay times. The effect is examined across Division I–III NCAA track teams. The results are consistent across each division. We view this as a test of the role of specialization on performance. Using runners who specialize in 400 m races should increase overall team performance as long as specialization does not lead to an inefficient allocation of team human capital. An additional performance measure is used examining the difference between projected and actual relay times. Divisions I and II are found to perform better than projected with an increase in 400 m runners, but there is no effect found in Division III.

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