Linguistic variables of Comprehensibility, Accentedness and Fluency in L2 Spanish: Listener type and ability level differences

The aim of this study is to identify which linguistic variables are most strongly related to comprehensibility, accentedness and fluency in Spanish as L2, and how the results may also vary according to the type of listener (expert or non-expert) and to the speakers’ level of ability in these three dimensions. To this end, 40 native English speakers of Spanish orally described picture narratives that were subsequently rated by four groups of raters using 9-point Likert scales. The first two groups were composed of 109 novice and 42 expert raters assessing comprehensibility, accentedness and fluency. The last two groups consisted of 35 phoneticians and 35 linguistic raters responsible for analyzing and scoring a total of 14 speech measures (7 per group) targeting pronunciation, disfluencies, lexis, grammar and discourse. The results reveal that comprehensibility is associated with a wide range of elements, while accentedness is determined especially by segmentals, and fluency by speech rate. Additionally, the impact of linguistic parameters varies according to the speakers’ level of performance, and there are differences between novice and expert raters, with the former being more affected by pronunciation and the experts by lexis and grammar.

Characterizing speech rhythm using spectral coherence between jaw displacement and speech temporal envelope

Lower modulation rates in the temporal envelope (ENV) of the acoustic signal are believed to be the rhythmic backbone in speech, facilitating speech comprehension in terms of neuronal entrainments at δ- and θ-rates (these rates are comparable to the foot- and syllable-rates phonetically). The jaw plays the role of a carrier articulator regulating mouth opening in a quasi-cyclical way, which correspond to the low-frequency modulations as a physical consequence. This paper describes a method to examine the joint roles of jaw oscillation and ENV in realizing speech rhythm using spectral coherence. Relative powers in the frequency bands corresponding to the δ-and θ-oscillations in the coherence (respectively notated as %δ and %θ) were quantified as one possible way of revealing the amount of concomitant foot- and syllable-level rhythmicities carried by both acoustic and articulatory domains. Two English corpora (mngu0 and MOCHA-TIMIT) were used for the proof of concept. %δ and %θ were regressed on utterance duration for an initial analysis. Results showed that the degrees of foot- and syllable-sized rhythmicities are different and are contingent upon the utterance length.

The perception of multiethnolectal Zurich German: A continuum rather than clear-cut categories

Since about 2000, the emergence of so-called ‘multiethnolects’ has been observed among adolescents in German-speaking Switzerland; however, a systematic description of these varieties is lacking at present. The few existing perception studies of multiethnolects in other European countries are usually based on two or more predetermined groups that are compared. This paper investigates which labels are used for multiethnolectal Zurich German and how this way of speaking is perceived by adolescents; we adopt a perceptual sociolinguistics approach which focuses on the conceptualizations of lay people rather than on those of linguists. In a rating experiment, 40 adolescents listened to short speech samples of 48 pupils recorded in two different schools in the city of Zurich and were asked to rate the speakers on a 7-point Likert scale according to how multiethnolectal they sounded (not at all – very strongly). The results yielded a perceptual continuum rather than a clear-cut binary categorization [±multiethnolectal]. A smaller follow-up experiment with 12 adult raters (using the same stimuli) yielded a highly significant correlation between the mean rating scores of the two groups of raters.

Articulatory characterization of the alveolar sibilant fricatives of Basque: Part one

An articulatory analysis of the two alveolar sibilant fricatives of Basque (<z> and <s>) is presented, based on fifteen collections of 2D and 3D magnetic resonance images. By applying a set of phonetic, qualitative and quantitative parameters, two articulatory models for <z> and three for <s> are identified, and the procedures used to distinguish between them are examined. The main models are: dorsal denti-alveolar for <z> and apico-alveolar for <s>. Due to its length, the work is presented in two separate parts.

The prosodic properties of narrow information focus in Central Mexican Spanish: Pitch accents, de-emphasis and phrasing

This paper investigates the different prosodic strategies used for the marking of information focus in Central Mexican Spanish. For this purpose, we carried out a study of the prosodic properties of information focus both in clause final position and in situ. Our results show important differences when compared to other varieties of Spanish. Specifically, we observe that the most frequent accent signaling information focus is a monotonal pitch accent (L* or !H*) and not L+H*. Furthermore, in many cases we observe that the pitch accent is not the only mechanism used to signal the focus: this is because we observe the presence of prosodic edges to the left of the focus, presumably functioning as an additional prosodic cue to identify it. Additionally, while we do not observe deaccenting of post-focal material, we do observe a sequence of non-rising forms (a flat pattern or “de-emphasis”) following the pitch accent that signals an in situ information focus forced by the test. With respect to phonological phrasing, our results confirm the analysis in Prieto (2006), where it is proposed that syntactic constituency is not the primary factor that regulates phrasing in Spanish.

Investigating speaker individuality in the Swiss Standard German of four Alemannic dialect regions: Consonant quantity, vowel quality, and temporal variables

While German-speaking Switzerland manifests a considerable amount of dialectal diversity, until the present day the phonetic interrelation of Alemannic (ALM) dialects and spoken Swiss Standard German (SSG) has not been studied with an acoustic phonetic approach on the speaker level. In this study, out of a pool of 32 speakers (controlled for sex, age, and education level) from 4 dialectologically distinct ALM areas, 16 speakers with 2 dialects were analysed regarding SSG consonant duration (in words whose ALM equivalents may or may not have a geminate), 8 speakers from the city of Bern (BE) were analysed for vowel quality, and 32 speakers were analysed for temporal variables, i.e., articulation rate (AR) and vocalic-speech percentage (%V). Results reveal that there is much intradialectal inter- and intraspeaker variation in all three aspects scrutinised, but especially regarding vowel quality of BE SSG mid vowels and temporal variables. As for consonant quantity, while intradialectal interspeaker variation was observed, speakers showed a tendency towards normalised SSG consonant durations that resemble the normalised consonant durations in their ALM dialect. In general, these results suggest that a speaker’s dialect background is only one factor amongst many that influence the way in which Swiss Standard German is spoken.

The relationship between palatalisation and labial consonants in Castilian Spanish

In spite of the many studies devoted to the palatal outcomes of the Latin clusters PL and FL in Old Spanish, some other clusters and sequences composed of labial consonants such as -PUL-, -BVL-, -BE,I-, -VE,I- and -MI- have received little attention. The aim of this paper is to analyze the phonetic aspects of the diachronic evolution of these clusters and sequences into their Old Spanish outcomes [ʎ], [ɟ] y [ɲtʃ]. To this end, experimental, dialectal and comparative data from Old Spanish as well as from other Romance languages will be used. This will lead to the conclusion that the sound changes in both [Clabial + l] and [Clabial + j] clusters were based on the same articulatory mechanisms: a strengthening of the segment following the labial consonant and the later deletion of the labial, if it was a stop, or its assimilation to the point of articulation of the palatal, if it was a nasal. The implications of these conclusions for the evolution of pl and fl clusters in Old Spanish, as well as for the methodology in historical phonetics, will be pointed out.

Rhythm and speech rate as a diagnostic aid in neurodegenerative syndromes of the front-temporal lobes

Temporal variables have proven to be an effective tool to characterize speech in neurodegenerative diseases and primary progressive aphasia variants, but the evidence available so far is essentially limited to English. This article analyses, by means of a small sample of seven patient groups and a control group (total n = 34; control group = 6; progressive primary aphasia, en three variants = 15; fronto-temporal dementia in two variants = 9; supranuclear progressive palsy = 3; cortico-basal syndrome = 2), the temporal parameters of speech rate, vowel duration, consonant duration, and nine rhythmic metrics (%V, %C, ΔV, ΔC, VarcoV, VarcoC, rPVI-V, rPVI-C, nPVI-V). The results indicate that speech rate is slower in patients with primary progressive non-fluent aphasia (APPnf), amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), or corticobasal syndrome (CBS) than in controls. These three clinical groups, as well as those suffering from progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP), have longer segmental durations, especially in consonants. Among the rhythm metrics, %C, ΔV and rPVI-C also allow to differentiate between groups, specifically, between control and APPlog, ELA-DFT y SCB.

Perception of the bilabial-labiodental contrast in the approximant consonants of the Chilean Spanish

Until recently, the consensus was that labiodental realizations of Spanish /b/ did not exist, and that consequently this variation in place of articulation could be safely disregarded. However, new evidence emerged showing that labiodental variants of /b/ do exist in relatively high numbers, at least in some dialects such as in Chilean Spanish. This study set out to determine whether Chilean Spanish listeners are able to perceive the differences between bilabial and labiodental approximant variants of Spanish /b/ (i.e., [β̞] versus [ʋ]). In order to test this, natural and synthetic stimuli were presented to 31 native listeners in identification and discrimination tasks. Results showed that, while the identification task with natural stimuli provided mixed evidence of sensitivity to the contrast, the identification and discrimination tasks with synthetic stimuli provided no evidence of listeners perceiving the phonetic contrast categorically. In sum, listeners do no seem able to perceive the acoustic differences between the two segments, and thus it is unlikely that this phonetic contrast could be employed to encode sociolinguistic information.

The perception-prodution link and linguistic theory

Recent trends in infant (and adult) speech perception studies, especially in the psychological literature where much of the speech perception work is being and has been done, shows a growing focus on more integrated perception-production-sensorimotor (PPS) bases for perception (Werker & Gervain 2013). We look here at whether the results of such studies are significant for theoretical linguistics – specifically for the fundamental question of how the linguistic system is acquired. We examine a selection of recent experimental results, using Bruderer, Danielson, Kandhadai & Werker (2015) as the focal point.