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

Differential recognition of pitch patterns in discrete and gliding stimuli in congenital amusia: Evidence from Mandarin speakers

2012 ◽  
Vol 79 (3) ◽  
pp. 209-215 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fang Liu ◽  
Yi Xu ◽  
Aniruddh D. Patel ◽  
Tom Francart ◽  
Cunmei Jiang
Keyword(s):  
Congenital Amusia ◽  
Differential Recognition ◽  
Mandarin Speakers ◽  
Pitch Patterns

The Effects of Acoustic Variation on the Perception of Lexical Tone in Cantonese-Speaking Congenital Amusics

2019 ◽  
Vol 62 (1) ◽  
pp. 190-205 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jing Shao ◽  
Rebecca Yick Man Lau ◽  
Phyllis Oi Ching Tang ◽  
Caicai Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Speech Processing ◽  
Phonological Processing ◽  
Lexical Tone ◽  
Pitch Processing ◽  
Low Level ◽  
Tone Perception ◽  
Congenital Amusia ◽  
Tone Discrimination ◽  
High Level ◽  
Acoustic Variation

Purpose Congenital amusia is an inborn neurogenetic disorder of fine-grained pitch processing. This study attempted to pinpoint the impairment mechanism of speech processing in tonal language speakers with amusia. We designed a series of perception tasks aiming at selectively probing low-level pitch processing and relatively high-level phonological processing of lexical tones, with an aim to illuminate the deficiency mechanism underlying tone perception in amusia. Method Sixteen Cantonese-speaking amusics and 16 matched controls were tested on the effects of acoustic (talker/syllable) variations on the identification and discrimination of Cantonese tones in two conditions. In the low-variation condition, tones were always associated with the same talker or syllable; in the high-variation condition, tones were associated with either different talkers (with the syllable controlled) or different syllables (with the talker controlled). Results Largely similar results were obtained in talker and syllable variation conditions. Amusics exhibited overall poorer performance than controls in tone identification. Although amusics also demonstrated poorer performance in tone discrimination, the group difference was more obvious in low-variation conditions, where more acoustic constancy was provided. Besides, controls exhibited a greater increase in discrimination sensitivity from high- to low-variation conditions, implying a stronger benefit of acoustic constancy. Conclusions The findings suggested that amusics' lexical tone perception abilities, in terms of both low-level pitch processing and high-level phonological processing, as measured in low- and high-variation conditions, are impaired. Importantly, amusics were more impaired in taking advantage of low acoustic variation contexts and thus less efficiently sharpened their perception of tones when perceptual anchors in talker/syllable were provided, suggesting a possible “anchoring deficit” in congenital amusia. Supplemental Material https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.7616555

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.

scholarly journals Erratum: Corrigendum: Abnormal topological organization of the white matter network in Mandarin speakers with congenital amusia

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yanxin Zhao ◽  
Xizhuo Chen ◽  
Suyu Zhong ◽  
Zaixu Cui ◽  
Gaolang Gong ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
White Matter ◽  
Congenital Amusia ◽  
Topological Organization ◽  
Mandarin Speakers

scholarly journals Dissociation of tone merger and congenital amusia in Hong Kong Cantonese

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (7) ◽  
pp. e0253982
Author(s):  
Caicai Zhang ◽  
Oi-Yee Ho ◽  
Jing Shao ◽  
Jinghua Ou ◽  
Sam-Po Law
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Speech Processing ◽  
Individual Variation ◽  
Musical Training ◽  
Congenital Amusia ◽  
Musical Perception ◽  
Close Relationship ◽  
Hong Kong Cantonese ◽  
Tone Discrimination

While the issue of individual variation has been widely studied in second language learning or processing, it is less well understood how perceptual and musical aptitude differences can explain individual variation in native speech processing. In the current study, we make use of tone merger in Hong Kong Cantonese, an ongoing sound change that concerns the merging of tones in perception, production or both in a portion of native speakers, to examine the possible relationship between tone merger and musical and pitch abilities. Although a previous study has reported the occurrence of tone merger independently of musical training, it has not been investigated before whether tone-merging individuals, especially those merging tones in perception, would have inferior musical perception and fine-grained pitch sensitivities, given the close relationship of speech and music. To this end, we tested three groups of tone-merging individuals with various tone perception and production profiles on musical perception and pitch threshold tasks, in comparison to a group of Cantonese speakers with congenital amusia, and another group of controls without tone merger or amusia. Additionally, the amusics were compared with tone-merging individuals on the details of their tone discrimination and production profiles. The results showed a clear dissociation of tone merger and amusia, with the tone-merging individuals exhibiting intact musical and pitch abilities; on the other hand, the amusics demonstrated widespread difficulties in tone discrimination yet intact tone production, in contrast to the highly selective confusion of a specific tone pair in production or discrimination in tone-merging individuals. These findings provide the first evidence that tone merger and amusia are distinct from each other, and further suggest that the cause of tone merger may lie elsewhere rather than being driven by musical or pitch deficits. We also discussed issues arising from the current findings regarding the neural mechanisms of tone merger and amusia.

What Is Left Is Right

2009 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 78-89 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenneth Hugdahl ◽  
René Westerhausen
Keyword(s):  
Speech Processing ◽  
Information Transfer ◽  
Hemispheric Asymmetry ◽  
Functional Neuroimaging ◽  
Gray Matter Volume ◽  
Functional Anatomy ◽  
Posterior Part ◽  
Functional Asymmetry ◽  
Planum Temporale ◽  
Evolution Of Speech

The present paper is based on a talk on hemispheric asymmetry given by Kenneth Hugdahl at the Xth European Congress of Psychology, Praha July 2007. Here, we propose that hemispheric asymmetry evolved because of a left hemisphere speech processing specialization. The evolution of speech and the need for air-based communication necessitated division of labor between the hemispheres in order to avoid having duplicate copies in both hemispheres that would increase processing redundancy. It is argued that the neuronal basis of this labor division is the structural asymmetry observed in the peri-Sylvian region in the posterior part of the temporal lobe, with a left larger than right planum temporale area. This is the only example where a structural, or anatomical, asymmetry matches a corresponding functional asymmetry. The increase in gray matter volume in the left planum temporale area corresponds to a functional asymmetry of speech processing, as indexed from both behavioral, dichotic listening, and functional neuroimaging studies. The functional anatomy of the corpus callosum also supports such a view, with regional specificity of information transfer between the hemispheres.

Rate-Dependent Speech Processing Can be Domain Specific

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine M. Szostak ◽  
Mark A. Pitt ◽  
Laura C. Dilley
Keyword(s):  
Speech Processing ◽  
Domain Specific ◽  
Rate Dependent
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