• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.1 no.3
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• pp.19-28
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• 2009

This paper reports experimental findings about the duration feature of the acoustic components of English stops in Korean speakers' voicing perception. In our experiment, 35 participants discriminated between recorded stimuli and digitally transformed stimuli with different duration features from the original stimuli. 72 sets of paired stimuli are generated to test the effects of the duration feature in various phonetic contexts. The result of our experiment is a complicated cross-tabulation with 540 cells defined by five categorical independent variables plus one response variable. To find a meaningful generalization out of this complex frequency table, we ran logit log-linear regression analyses. Surprisingly, we have found that there is no single effect of the duration feature in all phonetic contexts on Korean speakers' perception of the voicing contrasts of English stops. Instead, the logit log-linear analyses reveal that there are interaction effects among phonetic contexts (=C), the places of articulation of stops (=P), and the voicing contrast (=V), and among duration (=T), phonetic contexts, and the places of articulation. To put it in mathematical terms, the distribution of the data can be explained by a simple log-linear equation, logF=${\mu}+{\lambda}CPV+{\lambda}TCP$.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.223-235
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• 2002

Unlike Seoul dialect, in the Busan dialect, /ㅅ/ and /ㅆ/ are phonemically non-distinctive and realization of tensing is non-productive, on the other hand, that of voicing is productive. In order to discover causes of such characteristics in Busan dialect, this paper firstly compared acoustic characteristics of Seoul dialect with those of Busan dialect on fricative /ㅅ/ and /ㅆ/. The result showed that Busan dialect has much shorter length of friction and aspiration intervals of word initial and word-medial position than Seoul dialect. I expect that these results are important keys to discover causes of the following characteristics of Busan-dialect - non-distinction, non-productivity of tensing, and productivity of voicing - on Fricative /ㅅ/ and /ㅆ/.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.35-51
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• 2000

The goal of this paper is to examine how Case Drop (the drop of the case markers) correlates with the prosodic structure in Korean. On the assumption that intervocalic Lenis Stop Voicing (LSV) applies within the domain of the Accentual Phrase (AP), voicing analyses are performed on intervocalic lenis stop consonants before and after Case Drop. A statistical analysis reveals that the drop of the nominative and accusative case markers significantly alter the AP structure. Pitch values will then be extracted to verify that such changes in the AP structure conform to the pitch properties proposed for the AP (Jun 1993, 1998). The results show that the AP structure suggested by LSV does not always coincide with that imposed by the pitch properties.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.19-33
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• 2006

This study explores whether Russian, known to have a process of syllable-final devoicing, reveals differences in vowel duration as a function of the underlying voicing of the coda stop. This paper also examines whether non-native speakers of Russian and English learn typical L2 values in vowel duration. The results indicate that vowels in Russian have a slightly longer mean duration before a voiced stop than before a voiceless stop (a mean difference of 9.52 ms), but in most cases the differences did not exhibit statistical significance. In English the mean difference was 60.05 ms, and the differences were in most cases statistically significant. All native Russian speakers of English produced larger absolute differences in vowel duration for English than for Russian, and all native English speakers of Russian produced smaller absolute differences for Russian than for English. More experienced learners seemed to achieve more native-like values of vowel duration than less experienced learners did, suggesting that learning occurs gradually as the learners gain more experience with the L2.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.11-16
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• 2023

The present study examines how a cognitive attention affects Korean learners of English (L2) in perceiving the English stop voicing distinction (/d/-/t/). This study tested the effect of attentional distractor on primary and non-primary acoustic cues, focusing on the role of Voice Onset Time (VOT) and fundamental frequency (F0). Using the dual-task paradigm, 28 Korean adult learners of English participated in the stop identification task carried with (distractor) and without (no-distractor) arithmetic calculation. Results showed that when distracted, Korean learners' sensitivity to VOT decreased as priorly reported with native English speakers. Furthermore, as F0 is a primary cue for a L1 Korean stop laryngeal contrast, its role in L2 English voicing distinction was also affected by a distractor, without compensating for the reduced VOT sensitivity. These findings suggest that flexible use of multiple cues in L1 is not necessarily beneficial for L2 phonological processing when coping with a adverse listening condition.

• The Journal of the Acoustical Society of Korea
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.56-62
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• 2001

In this paper, we adopt a missing data theory to speech recognition. It can be used in order to maintain high performance of speech recognizer when the missing data occurs. In general, hidden Markov model (HMM) is used as a stochastic classifier for speech recognition task. Acoustic events are represented by continuous probability density function in continuous density HMM(CDHMM). The missing data theory has an advantage that can be easily applicable to this CDHMM. A marginalization method is used for processing missing data because it has small complexity and is easy to apply to automatic speech recognition (ASR). Also, a spectral subtraction is used for detecting missing data. If the difference between the energy of speech and that of background noise is below given threshold value, we determine that missing has occurred. We propose a new method that examines the reliability of detected missing data using voicing probability. The voicing probability is used to find voiced frames. It is used to process the missing data in voiced region that has more redundant information than consonants. The experimental results showed that our method improves performance than baseline system that uses spectral subtraction method only. In 452 words isolated word recognition experiment, the proposed method using the voicing probability reduced the average word error rate by 12％ in a typical noise situation.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.5 no.4
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• pp.129-136
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• 2013

This study investigated how acoustic characteristics (i.e., duration, F1, F2) of English high front vowels /i, ɪ/ are modulated by boundary- and prominence-induced strengthening in native vs. non-native (Korean) speech production. The study also examined how the durational difference in vowels due to the voicing of a following consonant (i.e., voiced vs. voiceless) is modified by prosodic strengthening in two different (native vs. non-native) speaker groups. Five native speakers of Canadian English and eight Korean learners of English (intermediate-advanced level) produced 8 minimal pairs with the CVC sequence (e.g., 'beat'-'bit') in varying prosodic contexts. Native speakers distinguished the two vowels in terms of duration, F1, and F2, whereas non-native speakers only showed durational differences. The two groups were similar in that they maximally distinguished the two vowels when the vowels were accented (F2, duration), while neither group showed boundary-induced strengthening in any of the three measurements. The durational differences due to the voicing of the following consonant were also maximized when accented. The results are discussed further in terms of phonetics-prosody interface in L2 production.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.113-128
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• 2005

The underlying premise of this study was that L1 production is easily transferred into L2 production. In neutral intonation, there is a consonant-tone correlation in Korean: High tone patterns are correlated with voiceless aspirated and tense consonants and Low-High tone patterns are correlated with lax or other voiced consonants. The purpose of this study was to see whether the correlation in Korean (L1) is transferred into English (L2) production and whether the degree of transfer differs depending on the degree of proficiency. Eight Korean speakers and two American speakers participated in the experiment. F0 contours of words and sentences were collected and analyzed. The results of the present study showed that there is a strong correlation between voicing and tone in L2 utterances. When utterance-initial consonant types were voiceless, the word or the sentence began with the H pattern; otherwise it had the LH pattern. The degree of interference differed depending on the degree of proficiency: less proficient speakers showed a stronger correlation in terms of the magnitude (Hz) and size (ms) of the effects on F0. The results indicate that the consonant-tone correlation in L1 is strongly transferred into L2 production and the correlation transfer can be one of the actual aspects that cause L2 speakers to produce deviant L2 accents and intonation.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.9-16
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• 2023

The current study investigated the influence of age of L2 acquisition (AOA) and length of residence (LOR) in the L2 setting country on the production of voicing-conditioned vowel duration and spectral qualities in English by Korean learners. The primary aim was to explore the ways in which the language-specific phonetic features are acquired by the age of onset and L2 experience. Analyses of the archived corpus data produced by 45 native speakers of Korean showed that, regardless of AOA or LOR, absolute vowel duration was used as a salient correlate of voicing contrast in English for Korean learners. The accuracy of relative vowel duration was influenced more by onset age than by L2 experience, suggesting that being exposed to English at an early age may benefit the acquisition of temporal dimension. On the other hand, the spectral characteristics of English vowels were more consistently influenced by L2 experience, indicating that immersive experience in the L2 speaking environment are likely to improve the accurate production of vowel quality. The distinct influence of the onset age and L2 experience on the specific phonetic cues in L2 vowel production provides insight into the intricate relationship between the two factors on the manifestation of L2 phonological knowledge.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Laryngology, Phoniatrics and Logopedics
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.39-42
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• 1996

The present study analyed jitter and shimmer of the deaf in 4 different voicing conditions. Thirty-two male subjects and 27 female subjects participated in the study on a voluntary basis. The age ranged from 6 to 18 for male and 8 to 21 for female subjects. The subjects were either congenitally or prelingually deaf The four different voicing conditions included /a/ prolongation, counting, reading, and conversation. The experiment utilized CSL Visi-Pitch Model 6095(Kay Elemetrics Corp.) to sample and analyze the data. Both jitter and shimmer means were higher than the threshold values(normative data) reported. In addition, this investigation performed two separate 2-factor ANOVAs in order to determine if jitter and shimmer change as a function of gender and voicing condition. The results showed the following. First of all there was the gender effect on shimmer but not on jitter, in that male subjects 'shimmer was higher than females'. secondly, there was the voicing condition effect both on jitter and shimmer. /a/ prolongation and reading produced lower jitter than counting and conversation. /a/ prolongation produced lower shimmer than the remaining conditions. Finally, no interaction between gender and voicing condition existed.