• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.6 no.12
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• pp.186-191
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• 2006

The perception of English labial consonants was investigated via experiment where 40 Korean EFL learners identified nonwords with the target labial consonants [p, b, f, v] in 4 different prosodic locations: initial onset position, intervocalic position before stress, intervocalic position after stress, and final coda position. The overall result showed that the proportion of perception accuracy of the target consonants was rather low, amounting to only 55%. There was also a positional effect since the accuracy rates for perceiving the four target consonants differed by position. Specifically, the average accuracy rate of the target consonant identification was higher in intervocalic position before stress (70%) and initial onset position (67%) than in intervocalic position after stress (45%) and final coda position (36%). Further, the accuracy rate for [f] is was high in all prosodic locations except intervocalic position after stress. The perception patterns were accounted for by the markedness and perceptual factors in conjunction with stress location.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.80-84
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• 2006

Motivated by the fact that cluster reduction strategies such as inserting a vowel or deleting a consonant in resolving English complex clusters differ depending on studies, this paper investigates the repair strategies employed by Korean EFL students. A total of 60 college students participated in the present study and the participants' production of English voiceless word-initial and word-final clusters was measured using the materials designed for this study. It has been shown that prosodic positions such as onset and coda and the number of cluster sequences influenced cluster reduction strategies. The error rates of both insertion and deletion were noticeably higher in the coda position than in the onset position and both insertion and deletion error rates were higher in triconsonatal cluster than in biconsonantal cluster sequences. Overall, the insertion rate was higher than the deletion rate. However, the deletion rate was significantly higher than the insertion rate in triconsonantal coda cluster sequences. Because of this, the deletion rate was higher than the insertion rate for triconsonantal cluster sequences across onset and coda. Also, the high deletion rate of triconsonantal coda clusters contributed to the high deletion rate for the coda clusters in general.

• Proceedings of the Korea Contents Association Conference
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• 2006.11a
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• pp.788-791
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• 2006

The perception of English labial consonants was investigated via experiment where 40 Korean EFL learners identified nonwords with the target labial consonants [p, b, f, v] in 4 different prosodic locations. The results showed that there was a strong positional effect since the accuracy rates of the four target consonants differed by position. Specifically, the average accuracy rate for the target consonants was higher in the stressed intervocalic position and initial onset position than in the unstressed intervocalic position and final coda position. Further, the accuracy rate for [f] is was high in all prosodic locations except the unstressed intervocalic position. This is unexpected in markedness theory given that fricatives are assumed to be more difficult to learn than stops.

• The Journal of the Acoustical Society of Korea
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• v.26 no.5
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• pp.182-187
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• 2007

The present study was to investigate the speech intelligibility of esophageal speech, which is the way that the laryngectomized people who lost their voices by total laryngectomy can phonate by using the airstream driven into esophagus, not trachea. Three normal listeners transcribed the CVVand VCV syllables produced by 10 esophageal speakers. As a result, overall intelligibility of esophageal speech was 27%. Affricates showed the highest intelligibility, and fricatives, the lowest. In the aspect of the place of articulation, palatals were the most intelligble, and alveolars, the least. Most of the aspirated consonants showed a low intelligibility. The consonants in VCV syllables were more intelligible than the ones in CVV syllables. The low intelligibility of esophageal speakers is due to insufficient airflow intake into esophagus. Therefore, training to increase airflow intake, as well as correct articulation training, will improve their low intelligibility.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.45-55
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• 2021

This study aims to analyze the acoustic characteristics of Korean affricates produced by dysarthric speakers with cerebral palsy. Korean fricatives and affricates are the consonants that are prone to errors in dysarthric speech, but previous studies have focused only on fricatives. For this study, three affricates /tɕ, tɕ^h, ͈tɕ/ appearing at word initial and intervocalic positions produced by six mild-moderate male speakers of spastic dysarthria are selected from a QOLT database constructed in 2014. The parameters representing the acoustic characteristics of Korean affricates were extracted by using Praat: frication duration, closure duration, center of gravity, variance, skewness, kurtosis, and central moment. The results are as follows: 1) frication duration of the intervocalic affricates produced by dysarthric speakers was significantly longer than that of the non-disordered speakers; 2) the closure duration of dysarthric speakers was significantly longer; 3) in the case of the center of gravity, there was no significant difference between the two groups; 4) the skewness of the dysarthric speakers was significantly larger; and 5) the central moment of dysarthric speakers was significantly larger. This study investigated the characteristics of the affricates produced by dysarthric speakers and differences with non-disordered speakers.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.33-40
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• 2024

This study investigated acoustic features in spectral moment analysis, comparing accurate articulations with distortions of alveolar fricatives such as dentalization, palatalization, and lateralization. A retrospective analysis was conducted on speech samples from 61 children (mean age: 5.6±1.5 years, 19 females, 42 males) using the Assessment of Phonology & Articulation for Children (APAC) and Urimal-test of Articulation and Phonology I (U-TAP I). Spectral moment analysis was applied to 169 speech samples. The results revealed that the center of gravity of accurate articulations was higher than that of palatalization, while palatalization was lower than dentalization. The variance of dentalization was higher than that of both accurate articulations and palatalization. The skewness of dentalization was higher than that of accurate articulations, and the skewness of palatalization was higher than that of accurate articulations. The kurtosis of palatalization was higher than that of both accurate articulations and dentalization. No significant differences were observed for the position of fricatives (initial, medial) and tense type (plain, tense) across all variables of spectral moment analysis for each distortion type. This study confirmed distinct patterns in center of gravity, variance, skewness, and kurtosis depending on the type of alveolar fricative distortion. The objective values provided in this study will serve as foundational data for diagnosing alveolar fricative distortions in children with speech sound disorders.