• Speech Sciences
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.89-99
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• 2005

The purpose of the present study were (1) to assess differences in tongue performances and speech intelligibility between normal and dysarthric speakers; and (2) to analyze the possible interrelationships between tongue strength, range of motion, and speech intelligibility in dysarthric patients. In order to measure maximum strength of anterior and lateral tongue strength, a force transducer has been designed. And a ruler was used for guaging range of motion. 'Word intelligibility test' was administered to each group. The results were analyzed by a quantitative statistical method(t test, Pearson product- moment correlation, and one-way ANOVA). The results were as follows; (1) dysarthric speakers showed significantly poorer performance than the normal in the tongue strength, range of motion, and speech intelligibility tasks; (2) the correlation between speech intelligibility and instrumental tongue performance was high in the dysarthric group; and (3) instrumental assessment was coincide with perceptual judgement of dysarthric tongue performance. The present investigation demonstrated that tongue weakness is causally related to articulation deficits in dysarthric. The clinical use of the force transducer would help a speech pathologist to quantify the degree of tongue weakness.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.1 no.4
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• pp.171-176
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• 2009

Intelligibility measurement is one criterion for the assessment of the severity of speech disorders especially of dysarthric persons. Rate control, usually rate reduction, is used with many dysarthric speakers to improve their intelligibility. The purpose of this study is to compare how change intelligibility of speech produced by cerebral palsic speakers according to three speaking conditions. Speech samples were collected from 10 adults with cerebral palsy were asked to speak under three speaking conditions-(1) naturally(control), (2) more slowly(rate control), (3) louder and accurately(clear speech). In a perception test, after listening to the speech samples, a group of three judges were to write down whatever they heard. The result showed that total cerebral palsic subjects were divided into two subgroups according to their intelligibility according to three speaking conditions. Some subjects showed that speech intelligibility increased greatly if asked to speak 'louder and more accurately'. and the others showed no difference of intelligibility according to the speaking conditions. This study suggested that it would be useful clinically to find out the best instruction to improve intelligibility suitable for each speaker with cerebral palsy.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.5 no.4
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• pp.33-41
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• 2013

This study investigated the perceptual and cepstral/spectral characteristics of phonation and their relationships in dysarthria in connected speech. Twenty-two participants were divided into two groups; the eleven dysarthric speakers were paired with matching age and gender healthy control participants. A perceptual evaluation was performed by three speech pathologists using the GRBAS scale to measure the cepstrual/spectral characteristics of phonation between the two groups' connected speech. Correlations showed dysarthric speakers scored significantly worse (with a higher rating) with severities in G (overall dysphonia grade), B (breathiness), and S (strain), while the smoothed prominence of the cepstral peak (CPPs) was significantly lower. The CPPs were significantly correlated with the perceptual ratings, including G, B, and S. The utility of CPPs is supported by its high relationship with perceptually rated dysphonia severity in dysarthric speakers. The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis showed that the threshold of 5.08 dB for the CPPs achieved a good classification for dysarthria, with 63.6% sensitivity and the perfect specificity (100%). Those results indicate the CPPs reliably distinguished between healthy controls and dysarthric speakers. However, the CPP frequency (CPP F0) and low-high spectral ratio (L/H ratio) were not significantly different between the two groups.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.2 no.2
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• pp.85-92
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• 2010

The purpose of this study was to know the differences in perceptual judgement for speech intelligibility in monosyllables by inexperienced listeners and vowel space area according to different dysarthric severity. Three dysarthric speakers with different severity(mild, moderate and severe) screened by 3 clinicians' screening tests before the experiment were conducted. Corner vowels (i, u, ae, a) in monosyllable level (CVC, 'p_p') and carrier phrases ('종이에_써') were chosen and analyzed for vowel space. Inexperience listeners (n=20) performed the intelligibility test for spoken syllables and carrier phrases by dysarthric speakers. The results show that there is a significant differences in both F1 and F2 values among 4 corner vowels. Vowel space area in the data of mildly impaired speakers was significantly higher than two others. In the scores of speech intelligibility judged by inexperienced listeners, the scores by a moderately impaired speaker were more higher than two other speakers. The discrepancy between perceptual judgement by inexperienced listeners and vowel space area will be discussed in this area.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.129-141
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• 2004

An auditory-perceptual evaluation has long been utilized in assessing dysarthric speech. The process involves subjective judgement and the results might vary depending on clinical experiences or training of listeners. This study aimed to investigate reliability of the auditory-perceptual evaluation of 22 multi -dimensional variables on 6 patients with Parkinsonian speech disorders. Listeners were divided into two groups: one consisted of 6 speech therapists with clinical experiences for three years or more, and the other 6 graduate students without any previous clinical background. The results showed that the former evaluated dysarthric speech with higher inter-rater and intra-rater reliabilities than the latter. Furthermore, such speech variables as 'precise consonant: 'speech intelligibility: and 'SMR regularity' were more influenced than others by clinical experiences. We, therefore, postulated that a reliable auditory-perceptual evaluation of dysarthric speech may require adequate amount of clinical training of listeners.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.23-29
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• 2019

This study acoustically examines the quality of fricatives produced by ten dysarthric speakers with cerebral palsy. Previous similar studies tend to focus only on sibilants, but to obtain a better understanding of how dysarthria affects fricatives we selected a range of samples with different places of articulation and voicing. The Universal Access (UA) Speech database was used to select thirteen words beginning with one of the English fricatives (/f/, /v/, /s/, /z/, /ʃ/, /ð/). The following four measurements were taken for both dysarthric and healthy speakers: phoneme duration, mean spectral peak, variance and skewness. Results show that even speakers with mild dysarthria have significantly longer fricatives and a lower mean spectral peak than healthy speakers. Furthermore, mean spectral peak and variance showed significant group effects for both healthy and dysarthric speakers. Mean spectral peak and variance was also useful for discriminating several places of articulation for both groups. Lastly, spectral measurements displayed important group differences when taking severity into account. These findings show that in general there is a degradation in the production of fricatives for dysarthric speakers, but difference will depend on the severity of dysarthria along with the type of measurement taken.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.19-35
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• 2000

Speech evaluation and treatment planning for the patients with articulation disorders have traditionally been based on perceptual judgement by speech pathologists. Recently, various computerized speech analysis systems have been developed and commonly used in clinical settings to obtain the objective and quantitative data and specific treatment strategies. 10 dysarthric children (6 neurogenic and 4 functional dysarthria) participated in this experiment. Speech evaluation of dysarthria was performed in two ways; first, the acoustic analysis by Visi-Pitch and a Computerized Speech Lab and second, the perceptual scoring of phonetic errors rates in 100 word test. The results of the initial evaluation served as primary guidlines for the indivisualized treatment planning of each patient's speech problems. After mean treatment period of 5 months, the follow-up data of both dysarthric groups showed increased maximum phonation time, increased alternative motion rate and decreased occurrence of articulatory deviation. The changes of acoustic data and therapeutic effects were more prominent in children with dysarthria due to neurologic causes than with functional dysarthria. Three cases including their pre- and post treatment data were illustrated in detail.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.5 no.2
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• pp.11-22
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• 2013

The purpose of this study was to identify the relationship between the strength of the tongue/lip strength and speech production for dysarthric adults with cerebral palsy. The maximal tongue and lip strengths of 22 normal adults, 27 dysarthric adults (10 adults with mild dysarthria, 10 adults with moderate dysarthria, and 7 adults with severe dysarthria) were measured with Iowa Oral Performance Instrument (IOPI). The percentage of correct consonants (PCC) and speech intelligibility were calculated from the words and sentences spoken by the subjects. The results of the study are as follows: First, both the maximal tongue and the maximal lip strength differed significantly between the control group and the group with dysarthria. While the group with mild dysarthria did not show meaningful difference in maximal tongue and lip strengths from the control group, the group with moderate and severe dysarthria showed significantly weaker tongue and lip strength than the control group and the group with mild dysarthria. Second, the current study suggests the existence of a significant correlation between the maximal tongue and lip strength and the PCC and speech intelligibility within all subjects with dysarthria. These findings can serve as an effective foundation to diagnose dysarthria quickly and accurately. The results of this study also indicate that in addition to the maximal tongue strength, the maximal lip strength can prove to be an important index in predicting the speech intelligibility of dysarthric adults with cerebral palsy.

• Proceedings of the KSPS conference
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• 1996.02a
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• pp.9-22
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• 1996

Among the various dysarthric subtypes, diagnosis of ataxic dysarthria is rendered when the speech characteristics include imprecise and irregular articulatory breakdowns, marked degree of speech rate impairment, overall monopitch and monoloudness, and respiratory-articulatory incoordination. Traditionally, speech pathologists have relied only upon their ‘ears’ to describe and evaluate the dysarthric speech. A statement of percentage of correct words identified by a listener do not provide so much more than an index of severity. Within the same perceptual dimension, a carefully constructed speech intelligibility test can specify patterns of errors. The patterns can contain a diagnostic value as well as Provide strategies for remediation. The phonetically transcribed texts on single words and a standard passage, 'kail' produced by an ataxic dysarthria are presented in this report, with an emphasis of the articulatory error analysis. Furthermore,, acoustic tools [e.g., spectrography to measure formant transitions, segment durations, consonant spectra, etc.] are utilized to serve as basic measures that objectively document patients' speech intelligibility, Finally, the treatment methods [e.g., spectrography as a visual feedback, gestural reorganization using pacing method, DAF (Delayed Auditory Feedback)] to modify the dysarthric behaviors are presented.

• Proceedings of the KSPS conference
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• 2003.05a
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• pp.101-104
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• 2003

The purpose of this study was to compare acoustic differences of fricative /s/ between the dysarthric subjects and normal subjects. In additional, the subjects' speeches were evaluated in terms of word intelligibility containing /s/ and perceptual severity. Acoustic parameters were duration, peak frequency and intensity of /s/. The results showed that the first peak frequency and intensity of /s/ were significantly different between dysarthric subjetcts and normal subjects. Second, peceptual parameters were significantly different between dysarthric subjetcts and normal subjects. The Pearson correlation coefficient was used to determine the relationship between the acoustical and perceptual data. The results showed that there was a strong correlation between perceptual parameters and peak frequency of /s/.