A new method for the quantitative evaluation of degree of hoarsehess. Eiji Yumoto, Wilbur J. Gould (Lenox Hill Hospital,. Vocal Dynamics Laboratory, 100 East ...
TUESDAY
MORNING,
19 MAY
1981
CONVENTION
HALL,
9:00 A.M.
TO 12:36 P.M.
Session G. Speech Communication I: Acoustic Analysis Edward P. Neuburg, Chairman
National Security Agency (R5), Fort Meade, Maryland 20755 Contributed Papers 9:00
G1. Synthesisas feedback in field linguistics.Joseph E. Grimes (Phonetics Laboratory, DMLL, Ithaca, NY 14853)
Morrill Hall, Cornell University,
Interim field reports on the phonologies of previously undescribed languagescan be tested for consistency using synthesis-byrule techniques.Such a report on Mura-Piraha of Brazil provided information for the feature rule component of Hertz's Cornell SpeechResearchSystem. Values for the parameter rules came from spectrogramsmade from a tape recorded in the field containing the examples in the report. Both sets of rules were revised to improve the match between the synthesized speech and the recordings. Out of this revision came recommendations about changes to the phonological description that the investigator can follow up on his next opportunity to do field work. In the current absence of such opportunity, two groups of linguists attempted to transcribe the forms phonetically. One had special orientation to Mura-Piraha phonology and the other had only general phonetic background. Both confusion matrices are given.
9:12
G2. A new method for the quantitative evaluation of degree of hoarsehess.Eiji Yumoto, Wilbur J. Gould (Lenox Hill Hospital, Vocal Dynamics Laboratory, 100 East 77th Street, New York, NY, 10021), and Thomas Baer (Haskins Laboratories, 270 Crown Street, New Haven, CT 06510)
A sustained phonation of the vowel /a/ was separated into the harmonic and noise components by the PDP 11/45 computer. The ratio of the acoustic energy of the harmonic components to that of the noise components (H/N ratio) was calculated. The subjects consisted of twenty-five normals and forty-three pathological cases with varying degrees of hoarseness pre- and postoperatively. Sound spectrograms were made from the original phonation and the extracted noise sound. There was a highly satisfactory degree of separation of the noise components from the original phonation. The H/N ratio was a useful tool to quantitatively compare the degree of hoarseness of a posttreatment voice with that of a pretreatment voice. The critical range of the H/N ratio of normals was larger than that of the pathological cases. The theoretical basis of this method
will be discussed
9:24
in detail.
ß
G3. Second formants in fricatives. Sigfrid D. Soil (Department of Psychology, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742)
Acoustic analysesof the sibilant fricatives, [s, z, f, 3], produced in initial position before [a], [i], and [u] were performed. LPC spectra revealed reliable anticipatory vowel coarticulation effects, viz., spectral peaks affiliated with the second formant of the following vowel, present 30-60 ms before vowel onset. These peaks represent oral resonances excited by either aspiration or voicing and indicate that during the latter part of the fricative the constriction begins to open in anticipation of the vowel. Acoustic characteristics of the peaks varied with vowel context due to differ-
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J. Acoust.Soc. Am. Suppl.1, Vol. 69, Spring 1981
ences in the anticipatory coarticulation of each vowel. In the context of the high vowels, [i, u], both assimilation and articulatory overlap of the fricative and vowel configurations was evident from the frequencies of the clearly defined spectral peaks. However, in the [a] context the opposing configurations for the fricative constriction and the low back vowel, which are executed sequentially, resulted in poorly differentiated peaks. The data are congruent with perceptual evidence that high vowels are more accurately identified
than
low
vowels
in fricatives
excised
from
fricative-
vowel syllables, thus exemplifying links between articulatory, acoustic, and perceptual aspects of coarticulation.
9:36
G4. Cross-linguisticdifferences between fricatives; Jonas N. A. Nartey and Hector Raul Javkin (Phonetics Laboratory, Department of Linguistics, U.C.L.A., Los Angeles, CA 90024) Various cross-linguistic studies indicate that we can safely utilize formant frequency measures in distinguishing English [i], for instance, from French [i]. When it comes to fricatives, there is no reliable cross-linguistic method. This paper presents what we hope to be the dimensionsby which fricatives may be described in a meaningful cross-linguistic way. Five to ten speakers each of a number of American Indian, Indo-European, Asian, and African languages produced fricatives in a sentence frame in three-vowel environments; i-i, a-a, u-u. A 50 ms section of each fricative was subjected to a critical-band analysis. The resulting spectra were then compared for fricatives within and between the languages.
9:48
G5. Statistical analysisof cross-linguisticdifferencesbetween fricatives. Hector Raul Javkin and Jonas N. A. Nartey (Phonetics Laboratory, Department of Linguistics, U.C.L.A., Los Angeles, CA 90024)
*
The differences between fricatives in different languages have been difficult to determine because of a lack of agreed-upon param-
eters for characterizing fricatives. The spectra of fricatives in a number of unrelated languageswere analyzed into 22 critical bands within thefrequencies0-10 kHz. A PARAFAC analysiswasperformed within each languageacrossthree modes: Fricative, vowel environment, critical band. The analyses of the different languages were compared using P^R^F^C and canonical correlation. We hope to answerthe questionwhetherthe soundswhich have been described as the same tn different languagesare in fact the same.
10:00
G6. Spectral characteristicsof palato-alveolar affricates in three
languages. Ian Maddieson(PhoneticsLaboratory,Departmentof Linguistics, UCLA, Los Angeles CA 90024)
,
The spectral characteristicsof the fricative portion of palatoalveolar affricates in Spanish, Italian, and (British) English have been examined in order to obtain information on the extent and
natureof inter-languagedifferencesamongsimilarsounds,as well as
101stMeeting:AcousticalSocietyof America
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