| Budget Amount *help |
¥3,200,000 (Direct Cost: ¥3,200,000)
Fiscal Year 2005: ¥700,000 (Direct Cost: ¥700,000)
Fiscal Year 2004: ¥1,100,000 (Direct Cost: ¥1,100,000)
Fiscal Year 2003: ¥1,400,000 (Direct Cost: ¥1,400,000)
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| Research Abstract |
To understand genetic and environmental influences on human speech, perceptual and acoustic analyses were performed on standard speech samples collected in various speaker groups. Selected acoustic measures and perceptual judgments were further analyzed to determine key features that would explain individual differences of speech.
1. Speech samples of 114 normal speakers (44 young and 70 elderly adults) were analyzed to examine age and gender effects on perceptual and acoustic features. Speaking fundamental frequency was higher for some old man and lower for some old women than young adults. Speech rate was typically slower and mild hoarseness was noted in the elderly adults. Articulation was perceptually intact even in the elderly adults (i.e., free of misarticulation and abnormalities). In addition, a set of speech and voice samples of adult speakers (N=70) was presented to adult listeners for gender and age estimation. Gender and age were accurately estimated for normal speakers wher
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eas speakers with dysarthria (N=20) were mostly judged as older persons.
2. To examine intra-speaker variability, speech samples (oral reading and prolonged vowels) were obtained from young adults (N=8) across 10 days (twice in each day). Voice and speaking fundamental frequency, formant frequencies of vowels, sentence and word duration are measured, and approximately 10% of variations from mean were found regardless of speakers and measures.
3. Speech samples were collected from young children between age of 4 and 6 (N=54) and 23 twin pairs (N=46). Word duration was longer for younger age groups. An acoustic analysis of voiced alveolar flap /r/ in //terebi/ (television in Japanese) revealed that typical formant movement for /r/ were seen in some children, but stop gap (typically seen for voiced alveolar stop /d/, substitution)and missing target phone (omission) was found in productions of some children. Among 20 twin pairs, consistency of twin-pair articulation of /r/ in /terebi/ was 90% (18/20), based on normal productions (13 pairs) and defective articulation (5 pairs), and two defective articulation in different pairs.
4. Speech profiling was performed based on perceptual and acoustic features of speech samples quasi-randomly selected from adult and child speech (65 samples; 58 speakers). Speaking fundamental frequency (i.e., vocal pitch level), speech rate, vocal tract length estimated from higher formant frequencies were key features which effectively explained individual differences of speech. Pitch range (variability), disfluency, and other perceptual features can be used to describe and identify individual speakers. Less
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