• Journal of Audiology & Otology
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• 제25권3호
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• pp.124-130
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• 2021

Background and Objectives: The study investigated vowel context effects on the perception of stop consonants in Malayalam. It also probed into the role of vowel context effects in determining the frequency of occurrence of various consonant-vowel (CV) syllables in Malayalam. Subjects and Methods: The study used a cross-sectional pre-experimental post-test only research design on 30 individuals with normal hearing, who were native speakers of Malayalam. The stimuli included three stop consonants, each spoken in three different vowel contexts. The resultant nine syllables were presented in original form and five gating conditions. The consonant recognition in different vowel contexts of the participants was assessed. The frequency of occurrence of the nine target syllables in the spoken corpus of Malayalam was also systematically derived. Results: The consonant recognition score was better in the /u/ vowel context compared with /i/ and /a/ contexts. The frequency of occurrence of the target syllables derived from the spoken corpus of Malayalam showed that the three stop consonants occurred more frequently with the vowel /a/ compared with /u/ and /i/. Conclusions: The findings show a definite vowel context effect on the perception of the Malayalam stop consonants. This context effect observed is different from that in other languages. Stop consonants are perceived better in the context of /u/ compared with the /a/ and /i/ contexts. Furthermore, the vowel context effects do not appear to determine the frequency of occurrence of different CV syllables in Malayalam.

• 대한청각학회지
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• 제25권3호
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• pp.124-130
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• 2021

Background and Objectives: The study investigated vowel context effects on the perception of stop consonants in Malayalam. It also probed into the role of vowel context effects in determining the frequency of occurrence of various consonant-vowel (CV) syllables in Malayalam. Subjects and Methods: The study used a cross-sectional pre-experimental post-test only research design on 30 individuals with normal hearing, who were native speakers of Malayalam. The stimuli included three stop consonants, each spoken in three different vowel contexts. The resultant nine syllables were presented in original form and five gating conditions. The consonant recognition in different vowel contexts of the participants was assessed. The frequency of occurrence of the nine target syllables in the spoken corpus of Malayalam was also systematically derived. Results: The consonant recognition score was better in the /u/ vowel context compared with /i/ and /a/ contexts. The frequency of occurrence of the target syllables derived from the spoken corpus of Malayalam showed that the three stop consonants occurred more frequently with the vowel /a/ compared with /u/ and /i/. Conclusions: The findings show a definite vowel context effect on the perception of the Malayalam stop consonants. This context effect observed is different from that in other languages. Stop consonants are perceived better in the context of /u/ compared with the /a/ and /i/ contexts. Furthermore, the vowel context effects do not appear to determine the frequency of occurrence of different CV syllables in Malayalam.

• 말소리와 음성과학
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• 제8권3호
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• pp.111-116
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• 2016

The Nasometer is most commonly used to assess the presence and degree of resonance problems in clinical settings and it provides nasalance scores to identify the acoustic correlates of nasality. Nasalance scores are influenced by factors related to speakers and speech stimuli. This study aims to examine the effect of vowel context and length of stimuli and age on nasalance scores. The participants were 20 adults and 45 children ranging in age from 3 to 5 years. The stimuli consisted of 12 sentences containing no nasal consonants. The stimuli in the three vowel contexts (low, high, and mixed) consisted of 4, 8, 16, and 31-syllable long sentences. Speakers were asked to repeat each stimulus after examiner. The results indicated significant effects of vowel contexts and stimulus length on nasalance scores. The nasalance scores for the high vowel contexts were significantly higher than those for the mixed and low vowel contexts. The nasalance scores for the mixed vowel contexts were significantly higher than those for the low vowel contexts. Speakers had higher nasalance scores for 4-syllable long sentences and 31-syllable long sentences than for 16-syllable long sentences. The effect of age on nasalance scores was not significant. The results of the study suggest that the vowel context and length of speech stimuli should be carefully considered when interpreting the nasalance scores.

• 말소리와 음성과학
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• 제12권2호
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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.

• 말소리와 음성과학
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• 제6권4호
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• pp.17-26
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• 2014

The present study examined epenthetic vowels produced by Korean learners of English in read sentences, in terms of acoustic measures and extra-phonological factors. The results demonstrated three main findings. First, epenthetic vowels had relatively high F1 values and a wide range of F2 values. Most of the epenthetic vowels were inserted near Korean high central vowels, but some vowels were inserted near front vowels due to co-articulation with surrounding vowels. Second, vowel epenthesis was affected by the context. The results showed that the epenthesis was frequently seen with word junctions between obstruents (e.g., stops-fricatives). Third, Korean learners were not affected by English background and were very weakly affected by orthography. English experience, which is one of the extra-phonological factors, was not related to epenthesis production. However, orthography, the other extra-phonological factor, very weakly affected the amount of epenthesis production. Nine percent of all epenthesis production was affected by the English past-tense suffix '-ed'; approximately 70% of the participants were affected by this suffix. The findings of the present study contributed to understanding vowel epenthesis. First, the study revealed that the epenthetic vowels produced by Korean learners of English were close to the high central vowel, supporting previous studies that the epenthetic vowel is quite close to the shortest vowel. Second, the study examined the various phonetic environments of epenthetic vowels, revealing that vowel epenthesis occurred more frequently in a certain phonetic circumstance.

• 음성과학
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• 제7권1호
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• pp.217-232
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• 2000

In this study, I investigate the role of post-consonantal fundamental frequency (F0) as a cue for automatic distinction of types of Korean stops and affricates. Rather than examining data obtained by restricting contexts to a minimum to prevent the interference of irrelevant factors, a relatively natural speaker independent speech corpus is analysed. Automatic and statistical approaches are adopted to annotate data, to minimise speaker variability, and to evaluate the results. In spite of possible loss of information during those automatic analyses, statistics obtained suggest that vowel F0 is a useful cue for distinguishing manners of articulation of Korean non-continuant obstruents having the same place of articulation, especially of lax and aspirated stops and affricates. On the basis of the statistics, automatic classification is attempted over the relevant consonants in a specific context where the micro-prosodic effects appear to be maximised. The results confirm the usefulness of this effect in application for Korean phone recognition.

• 말소리와 음성과학
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• 제15권4호
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• pp.81-90
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• 2023

청지각적 평가 및 음향학적 분석은 음성평가를 위해 임상 현장에서 일반적으로 사용해오고 있다. 본 연구는 음성장애 환자의 청지각적 및 음향학적 측정 시 말 과제 효과를 조사하고자 한다. 음성장애로 진단받은 총 22명의 환자로부터 모음연장발성(/a/, /e/, /i/, /o/, /u/, /ɯ/, /ʌ/)과 연속구어('가을'표준문단의 9개 하위문장)를 녹음하였다. 음성장애 평가 및 치료 경험이 있는 2명의 음성언어치료사가 맹검 및 무작위 음성 샘플을 사용하여 GRBAS('G', 'R', 'B', 'A', 'S')척도 및 CAPE-V('OS', 'R', 'B', 'S', 'P', 'L')를 사용하여 청지각적 평가를 실시하였다. 또한, ADSV(analysis of dysphonia in speech and voice model)를 이용하여 켑스트럼 및 스펙트럼 측정치를 구하였다. 모음 유형에 따라 GRBAS 척도에서 'B'를 제외하고 청지각적 평가에 영향을 미치지 않았으나, CAPE-V에서는 'OS', 'R', 'B'에 영향을 미쳤다(p<.05). CPP 및 L/H ratio 는 모음 유형과 문장 위치의 영향을 받았다. 표준문단의 CPP값은 모든 모음에서 'G', 하위 9문장과 유의미한 부적 상관 관계가 나타났고, 특히, /e/모음(r=-.739)에서 가장 높은 상관관계를 보였다. 두 번째 문장의 CPP는 모든 모음과 높은 상관관계를 보였다. CAPE-V는 말 자극에 따라 GRBAS보다 청지각적 평가에 더 많은 영향을 받을 수 있으며, 'B' 척도, CPP, L/H ratio는 모음 유형과 자음을 포함한 문장 위치에 따라 영향을 받았다. 따라서, 음성 장애 환자의 음성 평가에서 모음을 사용할 때는 /a/뿐만 아니라 ' 기식성'음질과 음향적으로 상관성이 높은 /i/모음을 함께 사용하는 것이 유용할 수 있다. 또한 /e/모음은 한국 표준문단 '가을' 및 하위 문장들과 음향적으로 상관성이 높았으므로 문단 대신 사용할 수 있을 것이다. 또한, 음성장애 신호들이 대부분 비주기적이라는 점을 감안할 때, CPP와 함께 표준문단 중 가장 음향적으로 상관성이 높은 두 번째 문장을 사용할 수 있을 것이다. 이러한 결과는 말과제가 청지각적 평가 및 음향학적 측정에 미치는 영향에 대한 임상적 증거를 제공하며, 이는 음성장애 환자의 음성 평가에 대한 가이드라인을 제공하는 데 도움을 줄 수 있을 것이다.

• 말소리와 음성과학
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• 제6권4호
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• pp.3-15
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• 2014

An articulatory study (using an Electromagnetic Articulography, EMA) was conducted to explore effects of prosodic boundary strength (Intonational Phrase/IP versus Word/Wd), and focus (Focused/accented, Neutral, Unfocused/unaccented) on the kinematic realization of /m/ in the coda (${\ldots}$am#i${\ldots}$) and the onset (${\ldots}$a#mi${\ldots}$) conditions in Korean. (Here # refers to a prosodic boundary such as an IP or a Wd boundary). Several important points have emerged. First, the boundary effect on /m/s was most robustly observed in the temporal dimension in both the coda (IP-final) and the onset (IP-initial) conditions, generally in line with cross-linguistically observable boundary-related lengthening patterns. Crucially, however, in contrast with boundary-related slowing-down effects that have been observed in English, both the IP-final and IP-initial temporal expansions of Korean /m/s were not accompanied by an articulatory slowing down. They were, if anything, associated with a faster movement in the lip opening (release) phase (into the vowel). This suggests that the mechanisms underlying boundary-related temporal expansions may differ between languages. Second, observed boundary-induced strengthening effects (both spatial and temporal expansions, especially on the IP-initial /m/s) were remarkably similar to prominence (focus)-induced strengthening effects, which is again counter to phrase-initial strengthening patterns observed in English in which boundary effects are dissociated from prominent effects. This suggests that initial syllables in Korean may be a common focus for both boundary and prominence marking. These results, taken together, imply that the boundary-induced strengthening in Korean is different in nature from that in English, each being modulated by the individual language's prosodic system. Third, the coda and the onset /m/s were found to be produced in a subtly but significantly different way even in a Wd boundary condition, a potentially neutralizing (resyllabification) context. This suggests that although the coda may be phonologically 'resyllabified' into the following syllable in a phrase-medial position, its underlying syllable affiliation is kinematically distinguished from the onset.

• 대한후두음성언어의학회지
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• 제16권1호
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• pp.33-48
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• 2005

Differential diagnosis of articulation and resonance problems in the cleft lip and palate speech is required for evaluating various factors contribute to speech problems such as VPI, dental occlusion, palatal fistulae, learning. However, validity of speech stimuli is current issue to evaluate accurately each problem in cleft speech. This study was conducted to investigate speech stimuli using in the clinical setting and review the literatures and articles published 1990 to 2005 for helping develop standardized speech samples. The results were recommendation to evaluate properly velopharyngeal function when conducting a diagnostic evaluation as follows : 1) In identification hypernasality, the speech stimuli should be included low pressure consonants to eliminate effects of nasal emission, compensatory articulation. 2) Speech stimuli should be consist of visual, front sounds to eliminate compensatory articulation and to stimulate easily. 3) Regarding early diagnosis and treatment, speech stimuli need to develop for infants and preschooler. 4) Stimulus length on nasalance scores should be at least 6 syllables. 5) In phonetic context on nasalance scores, /i/ vowel should be take into consideration excluding paragraph. 6) Connected speech stimuli should be developed for evaluating intelligibility and VP function.