• Communications for Statistical Applications and Methods
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.293-302
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• 2008

In this paper we propose a new feature, average power, for speech segments extraction with hidden Markov models, which is based on mel frequencies of speech signals. The average power is compared with the mel frequency cepstral coefficients, MFCC, and the power coefficient. To compare performances of three types of features, speech data are collected for words with explosives which are generally known hard to be detected. Experiments show that the average power is more accurate and efficient than MFCC and the power coefficient for speech segments extraction in environments with various levels of noise.

• 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.13 no.4
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• pp.32-39
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• 1994

As a basic research to realize Korean speech recognition system, phoneme recognition was carried out to find out ; 1) the best place which represents each phoneme's characteristics, and 2) the reasonable length of duration for obtaining the best recognition rates. For the recognition experiments, multi-speaker dependent recognition with Bayesian decision rule using 21 order of cepstral coefficient as a feature parameter was adopted. It turned out that the best place of feature extraction for the highest recognition rates were 10~50ms in vowels, 40~100ms in fricatives and affricates, 10~50ms in nasals and liquids, and 10~50ms in plosives. And about 70ms of duration was good enough for the recognition of all 35 phonemes.

• Proceedings of the Acoustical Society of Korea Conference
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• 1997.06a
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• pp.35-39
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• 1997

본 연구에서는 음소를 인식의 기본단위로 하는 한국어 단어인식 시스템의 인식정도를 개선하기 이해 각 음소의 시간방향의 정보를 포함하고 있는 동적특징인 회귀계수와 K-L(Karhunen-Loeve)변환으로 얻은 특징파라미터(이하 K-L계수라 함)를 이용하여 음소인식과 단어인식 실험을 수행한 결과 그 유효성을 확인하였다. 이를 위해 먼저 파열음을 대상으로 정적 특징과 파라미터인 멜-켑스트럼(Mel-Cepstrum)과 동적 특징 파라미터인 회귀계수(Regressive Coefficient) 와 K-L 계수(Karhunen-Loeve Coefficient)를 추출하여 음소 인식실험을 수행하였다. 그 결과 멜-켑스트럼을 사용한 경우 39.84%, 회귀계수를 사용한 경우 48.52%, K-L계수를 사용한 경우 52.40%의 인식률을 얻었다. 이를 참고로 각각의 특징 파라미터를 결합하여 인식실험한 결과 멜-켑스트럼과 K-L계수를 사용한 경우 47.17%,멜 -켑스트럼과 회귀계수의 경우 60.11%,K-L계수와 회귀계수의 경우 60.35%, 멜-켑스트럼과 K-L계수 , 회귀계수를 사용한 경우 58.13%를 인식률을 얻어 동적특징인 K-L 계수와 회귀계수를 사용한 경우와 멜-켑스트럼과 회귀계수를 사용한 경우가 높은 인식률을 보였으며 이를 단어로 확장하여 인식실험을 수행한 결과 기존의 특징 파라미터를 이용한 경우보다 높은 인식률을 얻어 동적 파라미터의 유효성을 확인하였다

• Speech Sciences
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.139-155
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• 2000

The aim of this research is to investigate acoustic characteristics of three different types of Korean Stops-plain, tensed, and aspirated-, and employ these as a base to determine which one(s) can be used as perceptual cues. In this paper, we have examined acoustic characteristics of Korean Stops, especially voice onset time(VOT), closure duration(CD), degree of pitch of following vowels and differences in the intensity of the Stops build-up after the onset of voicing. From the above characteristics, differences can be made between word-initial and word-medial positions. That is to say, in word-initial position, the three Korean Stops are distinguished by VOT and pitch, whereas in word-medial by CD, VOT and pitch. However, the acoustic characteristics do not have the same value as perceptual cues. In both word-initial, and medial positions, the immediately following vowels play the most important role in perceiving Korean Stops. And in case of word'-medial positions,. CD and VOT also play important perceptual roles. In order to have a more fine-grained distinction among Korean Stops, we think future research should be done to investigate which factor(s) of the following vowels is/are the most determinative perceptual cue(s). However, based on our investigation, we may conclude that it is highly plausible that pitch can be one of the most important perceptual cues when distinguishing the three Korean Stops.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.51-70
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• 2000

Twenty normal and 20 severe-to-profound hearing-impaired subjects participated in the present study. The two groups are matched by their chronological age. Each subject made a recording of three vowels of /i/, /a/, and /u/, and nine $VC_{plosive}V$ (hereafter, VCV) disyllables of /epe/, /ep'e/, /$ep^{h}e$/, /ete/, /et'e/, /$et^{h}e$/, /eke/, /ek'e/, and /$ek^{h}e$/, each five times. Formant frequencies of $F_1,\;F_2,\;and\;F_3$ were measured for the three vowels and six measures were made for the nine disyllables. The six measures were (1) the total duration of the disyllable, (2) the duration of the first vowel, (3) the duration of the closed period, (4) the ratio of the first vowel over the first vowel plus the closure period of the consonant, (5) the duration of the aspiration, and (6) the duration of the second vowel. Results shows that the three formants and each of the measures were significantly different between the two groups of subjects.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.57-65
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• 2015

This study aimed to identify the development pattern of final stop consonant perception using the gating task. Sixty-four subjects participated in the study: 16 children aged 4 years, 16 children aged 5 years, 17 children aged 6 years, and 15 adults. One-syllable words with consonant-vowel-consonant(CVC) structure, mokㄱ-motㄱ and papㄱ-patㄱ were used as stimuli in order to remove the redundancy of acoustic cues in stimulus words, 40ms-length (-40ms) and 60ms-length (-60ms) from the entire duration of the final consonant were deleted. Three conditions (the whole word segment, -40ms, -60ms) were used for this speech perception experiment. 48 tokens (4 stimuli ${\times}3$ conditions ${\times}4$ trials) in total were provided for participants. The results indicated that 5 and 6 year olds showed final consonant perception similar to adults in stimuli, papㄱ-patㄱ and only the 6-year-old children showed perception similar to adults in stimuli, 'mokㄱ-motㄱ. The results suggested that younger typically developing children require more acoustic information to accurately perceive final consonants than older children and adults. Final consonant perception ability may become adult-like around 6 years old. The study provides fundamental data on the development pattern of speech perception in normal developing children, which can be used to compare to those of children with communication disorders.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.67-77
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• 2015

The purpose of this study was to investigate how deaf parents influence the speech sounds of their normal-hearing children. Twenty four normal hearing children of deaf adults (CODA) and normal hearing parents (NORMAL) aged 3 to 4 participated in the study. The F1, F2, and the vowel triangle area in 7 vowels and the voice onset times (VOTs) and closure durations in 9 stops were measured. The results of the study are as follows. First, the F1 and F2 for all vowels were higher and the vowel triangle area was larger in CODA than in NORMAL although they were not statistically significant. Second, VOTs in $C_{stop}V$ for $/t^*/$ and in $VC_{stop}V$ for $/t^*/$, $/t^h/$, and $/k^h/$ were longer in CODA than in NORMAL. Most stops in CODA appeared to be longer VOTs for most phonemes. Third, the manner and place of articulation in stops did not make a difference between CODA and NORMAL in VOTs and closed durations. CODA does not demonstrate the speech characteristics of deaf people, however, they seem to speak differently than NORMAL, which means CODA might be influenced by a different linguistic environment created by deaf parents in some way.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.39-45
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• 2015

Changes in speech production in normal elderly might be subtle and gradual. Therefore, an acoustic analysis is appropriate to identify the effect of aging on speech. For this purpose, this study examined four speech parameters; voice onset time (VOT), VOT range, $f_0$ of following vowel($f_0FV$), and $f_0FV$ difference in two age groups, old (mean age 74.57 yrs.) and young (m: 27.43 yrs.). The results show that compared to the older group the younger demonstrated significantly shorter VOTs in lenis and longer in aspirated stop. VOT ranges were relatively broad and consequently overlapped between the phonation types (e.g., lenis, fortis, aspirated). The $f_0FV$ values in the older group which are an integral parameter with VOT were lower compared with the young group. The $f_0FV$ differences in the old female group were significantly narrower than the young female group, therefore, clear distinction became difficult. In conclusion, contrast in temporal information was obscured, and the domain of glottal information was diminished on stop consonants in Korean elderly. The findings suggest that central/peripheral changes by aging could lead to a deficit in coordination between phonation and articulation.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.5 no.3
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• pp.11-20
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• 2013

The purpose of this study is to compare the acoustic parameters of English stop consonants at the initial and after-initial-/s/ positions in a message produced by 47 Korean and American speakers in order to provide better pronunciation skills of English stops for Korean learners. A Praat script was developed to obtain voice onset time (VOT), maximum consonant intensity (maxCi), and rate of rise (ROR) from six target words with stops at the positions in the message. Results show that VOT and maxCi were significantly different between the two language groups while ROR wasn't. The Korean speakers generally produced the stop consonants with longer VOTs and higher consonant intensity. From the comparison of consonant groups at the two different positions, the Korean participants did not distinguish them as clearly as the American participants did at the after-initial-/s/ position. Finally a comparison of each language and sex group revealed that the major difference was attributed to stop consonants in the after-/s/ position. The author concluded that Korean speakers should be careful not to produce all the stops with longer VOTs and higher intensity. Further studies would be desirable to examine how Americans evaluate Korean speakers' English proficiency with modified acoustic values of English stops.