• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.17-27
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• 2020

This paper examines kinematic characteristics of /pk/ clusters, as compared to /kk/ and /pp/ with varying vowel contexts and speech rate. The results of EMMA data from eight Seoul-Korean speakers indicate as follows. Firstly, comparing /pk/ to /pp/ sequences, lips closing movement was faster and spatially greater in the /a/-to-/a/ context while temporally longer in the /i/-to-/i/ context. It was smaller in spatial displacement and shorter in temporal duration in /pk/ sequences. Peak velocity did not vary. Secondly, comparing /pk/ with /pp/ and /kk/ controls, lip aperture was less constricted in the /a/-to-/a/ context than /i/-to-/i/, but the maximum contact between the upper and lower lips was invariant across different vocalic contexts within /pk/ sequences (/apka/=/ipki/). Categorical reduction of C1 in /pk/ sequences fell in with the low-vowel and fast-rate conditions with across-/within-speaker variability. Gradient reduction of C1 was observed in all C1C2 types, being more frequent in fast rate. Lastly, the jaw articulator was a stable indicator of rate effects. The implication of the current study is that gestural reduction occurs with categorical reduction and general spatiotemporal weakening in the assimilating contexts, while quantitative properties of gestures may be a reason for gradient reduction, not necessarily confined to place assimilation.

• Journal of The Korean Association of Information Education
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.138-161
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• 1998

This research addresses to establish a systematic approach to design a standard Hangul code system for educational purposes in development of CAI courseware using Korean, English, and Chinese characters, which requires data exchanges and database construction. In this paper, types of Korean alphabetic code systems already in use, their representational environments and consonant/vowel order have been studied and analysed. This paper presents the requirements that the hangul code system for educational purpose needs to obtain. First, it should be able to represent all contemporary as well as ancient Korean alphabets. Second, character elements should be separable. Third, consonant/vowel order should be determined to easily retrieve and exchange data. Lastly, the code should maintain compatibility with other national codes and provide uniqueness of user-defined character codes.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.203-216
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• 2000

The purpose of this study is to revisit the property of the Korean plain stops in intervocalic position. More specifically, focusing on a word-internal, intervocalic position, this study investigates 1) how often speakers pronounce intervocalic. stops as fully voiced, 2) in what amount each speaker voice the plain stops during the stop closure, 3) whether the preceding or the following vowel influences the voicing of target consonants, and 4) the fundamental frequency pattern at the vowel onset after the target consonant shows any consistent pattern, regardless of whether voicing is present during the closure. The results of this study give strong support for the phonetic account of the voicing distinction in Korean. (Jun 1995, 1996).

• Proceedings of the KSPS conference
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• 2007.05a
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• pp.203-206
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• 2007

The purpose of this study was to investigate and quantitatively describe the acoustic characteristics of current Korean monophthongs. Recordings were made of 33 men and 27 women producing the vowels /i, e, ${\varepsilon}$, a, (표현불가), O, u, (표현불가)/ in a carrier phrase "This character is _." A listening test was conducted in which 19 participants judged each vowel. F1, F2, and F3 were measured from the vowels judged as intended vowels by more than 17 people from the listening test. Analysis of formant data shows some interesting results including the undeniable confirmation of 7-vowel system in current Korean.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.7 no.4
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• pp.107-121
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• 2000

In this paper, I investigate the acoustic correlates of a vowel's coarticulatory dynamics manifested in preceding and following consonants along two dimensions of the vocal tract: place of articulation and degree of constriction. Two dimensional coarticulation is not necessarily executed either concomitantly or proportionally, and the modification induced by coarticulation with a vowel in CVC structures is merely restricted to the CV portion; that is, the prevocalic consonant is modified solely in its constriction location. This is consistent with the observation that C-to-V place assimilation does not accompany consonant lenition in phonology, which suggests that phonetic nature is effectively reflected in phonological patterns.

• Proceedings of the KSPS conference
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• 2005.11a
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• pp.87-90
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• 2005

The aim of this paper is to investigate the prosodic characteristics of Korean distant speech. 36 2-syllable words of 4 speakers (2 males and 2 females) produced in both distant-talking and normal environments were used. The results showed that ratios of second syllable to first syllable in vowel duration and vowel energy were significantly larger in the distant-talking environment compared to the normal environment and f0 range also bigger in the distant-talking environment. In addition, 'HL%' contour boundary tone in the second syllable and/or 'L +H' contour tone in the first syllable were used in the distant-talking environment.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.21-28
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• 2012

Many previous studies reported acoustic parameters of English vowels produced by a clear speaking style. In everyday usage, we actually produce speech sounds with various speaking styles. Different styles may yield different acoustic measurements. This study attempts to examine pitch and formant trajectories of eleven English vowels produced by nine American males in order to understand acoustic variations depending on clear and conversational speaking styles. The author used Praat to obtain trajectories systematically at seven equidistant time points over the vowel segment while checking measurement validity. Results showed that pitch trajectories indicated distinct patterns depending on four speaking styles. Generally, higher pitch values were observed in the higher vowels and the pitch was higher in the clear speaking styles than that in the conversational styles. The same trend was observed in the three formant trajectories of front vowels and the first formant trajectories of back vowels. The second and third trajectories of back vowels revealed an opposite or inconsistent trend, which might be attributable to the coarticulation of the following consonant or lip rounding gestures. The author made a tentative conclusion that people tend to produce vowels to enhance pitch and formant differences to transmit their information clearly. Further perceptual studies on synthesized vowels with varying pitch and formant values are desirable to address the conclusion.

• Proceedings of the KSPS conference
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• 2000.07a
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• pp.364-364
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• 2000

It has been widely discussed in phonology that syllable structure of mother tongue influences one's acquisition of foreign language. However, the topic was hardly examined experimentally. So, we investigated effects of Korean syllable structure when Korean speakers pronounce English words, especially focusing on consonant strings that are not allowed in Korean. In the experiment, all the subjects are divided into 3 groups, that is, native, experienced, and inexperienced speakers. Native group consists of 1 male English native speaker. Experienced and inexperienced are each composed of 3 male Korean speakers. These 2 groups are divided by the length of residence in the country using English as a native language. 41 mono-syllable words are prepared considering the position (onset vs. coda), characteristic (stops, affricates, fricatives), and number of consonant. Then, the length of the consonant cluster is measured. To eliminate tempo effect, the measured length is normalized using the length of the word 'say' in the carrier sentence. Measurement of consonant cluster is the relative time period between the initiation of energy (onset I coda) which is acoustically representative of noise (consonant portion) and voicing. bar (vowel portion) in a syllable. Statistical method is used to estimate the differences among 3 groups. For each word, analysis of variance (ANDY A) and Post Hoc tests are carried out.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.1-8
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• 2019

Formant trajectories reflect the continuous variation of speakers' articulatory movements over time. This study examined formant trajectories of English vowels produced by ninety-three American men and women; the values were normalized using the scale function in R and compared using generalized additive mixed models (GAMMs). Praat was used to read the sound data of Hillenbrand et al. (1995). A formant analysis script was prepared, and six formant values at the corresponding time points within each vowel segment were collected. The results indicate that women yielded proportionately higher formant values than men. The standard deviations of each group showed similar patterns at the first formant (F1) and the second formant (F2) axes and at the measurement points. R was used to scale the first two formant data sets of men and women separately. GAMMs of all the scaled formant data produced various patterns of deviation along the measurement points. Generally, more group difference exists in F1 than in F2. Also, women's trajectories appear more dynamic along the vertical and horizontal axes than those of men. The trajectories are related acoustically to F1 and F2 and anatomically to jaw opening and tongue position. We conclude that scaling and nonlinear testing are useful tools for pinpointing differences between speaker group's formant trajectories. This research could be useful as a foundation for future studies comparing curvilinear data sets.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.45-53
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• 2019

The purpose of this work was to examine the factors affecting the identities of the voiceless plosives, i.e. English [p, t, k] and Korean [p^h, t^h, k^h], from the spontaneous speech corpora. The factors were automatically extracted by a Praat script and the percent correctness of the discriminant analyses was incrementally assessed by increasing the number of factors used in predicting the identities of the plosives. The factors included the spectral moments and tilts of the plosive release bursts, the post-burst aspirations and the vowel onsets, the durations such as the closure durations and the voice onset times (VOTs), the locations within words and utterances and the identities of the following vowels. The results showed that as the number of factors increased up to five, so did the percent correctness of the analyses, resulting in 74.6% for English and 66.4% for Korean. However, the optimal number of factors for the maximum percent correctness was four, i.e. the spectral moments and tilts of the release bursts and the following vowels, the closure durations and the VOTs. This suggests that the identities of the voiceless plosives are mostly determined by their internal and vowel onset cues.