Acoustic characterization and perceptual analysis of the relative importance of prosody in speech of people with Down syndrome

There are many studies that identify important deficits in the voice production of people with Down syndrome. These deficits affect not only the spectral domain, but also the intonation, accent, rhythm and speech rate. The main aim of this work is the identication of the acoustic features that characterize the speech of people with Down syndrome, taking into account the different frequency, energy, temporal and spectral domains. The comparison of the relative weight of these features for the characterization of Down syndrome people's speech is another aim of this study. The openSmile toolkit with the GeMAPS feature set was used to extract acoustic features from a speech corpus of utterances from typically developing individuals and individuals with Down syndrome. Then, the most discriminant features were identied using statistical tests. Moreover, three binary classiers were trained using these features. The best classication rate, using only spectral features, is 87.33%, and using frequency, energy and temporal features, it is 91.83%. Finally, a perception test has been performed using recordings created with a prosody transfer algorithm: the prosody of utterances from one group of speakers was transferred to utterances of another group. The results of this test show the importance of intonation and rhythm in the identication of a voice as non typical. As conclusion, the results obtained point to the training of prosody in order to improve the quality of the speech production of those with Down syndrome

Analysis of atypical prosodic patterns in the speech of people with Down syndrome

Producción CientíficaThe speech of people with Down syndrome (DS) shows prosodic features which are distinct from those observed in the oral productions of typically developing (TD) speakers. Although a different prosodic realization does not necessarily imply wrong expression of prosodic functions, atypical expression may hinder communication skills. The focus of this work is to ascertain whether this can be the case in individuals with DS. To do so, we analyze the acoustic features that better characterize the utterances of speakers with DS when expressing prosodic functions related to emotion, turn-end and phrasal chunking, comparing them with those used by TD speakers. An oral corpus of speech utterances has been recorded using the PEPS-C prosodic competence evaluation tool. We use automatic classifiers to prove that the prosodic features that better predict prosodic functions in TD speakers are less informative in speakers with DS. Although atypical features are observed in speakers with DS when producing prosodic functions, the intended prosodic function can be identified by listeners and, in most cases, the features correctly discriminate the function with analytical methods. However, a greater difference between the minimal pairs presented in the PEPS-C test is found for TD speakers in comparison with DS speakers. The proposed methodological approach provides, on the one hand, an identification of the set of features that distinguish the prosodic productions of DS and TD speakers and, on the other, a set of target features for therapy with speakers with DS.Ministerio de Economía, Industria y Competitividad - Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional (grant TIN2017-88858-C2-1-R)Junta de Castilla y León (grant VA050G18

Entrenamiento de la prosodia en personas con síndrome de Down mediante el uso de un videojuego educativo

Las personas con síndrome de Down tienen una serie de limitaciones cognitivas que afectan, entre otras cosas, al desarrollo de sus habilidades lingüísticas. Dentro de las áreas del lenguaje afectadas se encuentra la prosodia, que es la rama de la lingüística que estudia aspectos suprasegmentales del habla, como la entonación, el tono, el acento o el ritmo. La utilización de forma combinada de estos aspectos complementa la intención comunicativa de una producción oral, aportando matices fundamentales para la correcta transmisión del mensaje requerido por el hablante, como pueden ser la expresión de emociones o la adecuación a un contexto social concreto. El objetivo principal de esta tesis es la definición de un videojuego educativo enfocado al entrenamiento de algunos aspectos del lenguaje, especialmente los relacionados con la prosodia. Para lograr este objetivo, es necesario tener en cuenta las limitaciones cognitivas de las personas con síndrome de Down que afectan al uso de este tipo de herramientas y sus particularidades en el empleo de la prosodia. Tanto el diseño del videojuego como la interacción entre éste y el jugador deben motivar a los usuarios a completar las actividades de entrenamiento. Además, otro de los objetivos es definir un sistema de análisis de la calidad de las producciones orales centrado en la prosodia, con el objetivo de poder evaluar automáticamente dichas producciones de los jugadores y potenciar el uso autónomo de la herramienta.Departamento de Informática (Arquitectura y Tecnología de Computadores, Ciencias de la Computación e Inteligencia Artificial, Lenguajes y Sistemas Informáticos)Doctorado en Informátic

Searching for Best Predictors of Paralinguistic Comprehension and Production of Emotions in Communication in Adults With Moderate Intellectual Disability

Paralinguistic comprehension and production of emotions in communication include the skills of recognizing and interpreting emotional states with the help of facial expressions, prosody and intonation. In the relevant scientific literature, the skills of paralinguistic comprehension and production of emotions in communication are related primarily to receptive language abilities, although some authors found also their correlations with intellectual abilities and acoustic features of the voice. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate which of the mentioned variables (receptive language ability, acoustic features of voice, intellectual ability, social-demographic), presents the most relevant predictor of paralinguistic comprehension and paralinguistic production of emotions in communication in adults with moderate intellectual disabilities (MID). The sample included 41 adults with MID, 20–49 years of age (M = 34.34, SD = 7.809), 29 of whom had MID of unknown etiology, while 12 had Down syndrome. All participants are native speakers of Serbian. Two subscales from The Assessment Battery for Communication – Paralinguistic comprehension of emotions in communication and Paralinguistic production of emotions in communication, were used to assess the examinees from the aspect of paralinguistic comprehension and production skills. For the graduation of examinees from the aspect of assumed predictor variables, the following instruments were used: Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test was used to assess receptive language abilities, Computerized Speech Lab (“Kay Elemetrics” Corp., model 4300) was used to assess acoustic features of voice, and Raven’s Progressive Matrices were used to assess intellectual ability. Hierarchical regression analysis was applied to investigate to which extent the proposed variables present an actual predictor variables for paralinguistic comprehension and production of emotions in communication as dependent variables. The results of this analysis showed that only receptive language skills had statistically significant predictive value for paralinguistic comprehension of emotions (β = 0.468, t = 2.236, p < 0.05), while the factor related to voice frequency and interruptions, form the domain of acoustic voice characteristics, displays predictive value for paralinguistic production of emotions (β = 0.280, t = 2.076, p < 0.05). Consequently, this study, in the adult population with MID, evidenced a greater importance of voice and language in relation to intellectual abilities in understanding and producing emotions

The Hypothesis of Apraxia of Speech in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

In a sample of 46 children aged 4-7 years with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and intelligible speech, there was no statistical support for the hypothesis of concomitant Childhood Apraxia of Speech (CAS). Perceptual and acoustic measures of participants\u27 speech, prosody, and voice were compared with data from 40 typically-developing children, 13 preschool children with Speech Delay, and 15 participants aged 5-49 years with CAS in neurogenetic disorders. Speech Delay and Speech Errors, respectively, were modestly and substantially more prevalent in participants with ASD than reported population estimates. Double dissociations in speech, prosody, and voice impairments in ASD were interpreted as consistent with a speech attunement framework, rather than with the motor speech impairments that define CAS

Acoustic Changes during Passage Reading in Speakers with Parkinson\u27s Disease

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to evaluate speech changes in Parkinson’s disease (PD) while reading a passage, using both local (i.e., segment level) and global (i.e., utterance level) acoustic measures. Methods: 20 speakers participated in the study (10 PD, 10 neurologically healthy controls). The speakers were asked to read The Caterpillar passage in a conversational mode. A total of five acoustic measures were included (local: vowel duration, Euclidean distance between corner vowels and schwa; global: articulation rate, F0/intensity range). These acoustic measures were compared between two sentences located in the two positions within the paragraph, initial and final. Results: The findings indicated (1) overall speech differences between the two groups such as increased vowel duration and reduced vowel contrast and (2) speech differences between the beginning and end of the passage such as increased articulation rate toward the end. In addition, the results revealed that unlike control speakers, speakers with PD did not show a greater F0 and intensity range in the end compared to the beginning of the passage, which points a limited capability of prosody modulations in PD and its apparent pattern toward the end of passage reading. Discussion: Findings of this study support the notion that within- or across-task acoustic variation should be considered in speech sampling in clinical practice and research

The Biolinguistics of Autism: Emergent Perspectives

This contribution attempts to import the study of autism into the biolinguistics program by reviewing the current state of knowledge on its neurobiology, physiology and verbal phenotypes from a comparative vantage point. A closer look at alternative approaches to the primacy of social cognition impairments in autism spectrum disorders suggests fundamental differences in every aspect of language comprehension and production, suggesting productive directions of research in auditory and visual speech processing as well as executive control. Strong emphasis is put on the great heterogeneity of autism phenotypes, raising important caveats towards an all-or-nothing classification of autism. The study of autism brings interesting clues about the nature and evolution of language, in particular its ontological connections with musical and visual perception as well as executive functions and generativity. Success in this endeavor hinges upon expanding beyond the received wisdom of autism as a purely social disorder and favoring a “cognitive style” approach increasingly called for both inside and outside the autistic community

Validation of a Brief Prosody Rating Scale for Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Differences in the speech prosody, or melody of speech, of persons with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have long been noted by researchers. Yet, despite many studies, researchers have not identified a universal description of speech prosody in ASD. It may be flat or monotonous, not different from typical, or overly variable. However, atypical speech prosody can immediately set someone apart from their peers. This distinction could negatively social, academic, and vocational interactions. For those persons with ASD whose speech prosody is different from typical and interferes with daily functioning, valid, reliable, and efficient assessments of speech prosody are needed. Currently, there are only three validated assessments for speech prosody specific to ASD and none of them are simultaneously valid, reliable, and efficient. The purpose of this study was to design, validate, and establish sufficient reliability of a one-item, 7-point continuous rating scale for screening the speech prosody of children with ASD. Additionally, I investigated whether a brief, online training would improve reliability. The rating scale ranged from 1 (monotonous) to 7 (overly variable). Thirty-five 30-second audio clips from previous studies were chosen from children with ASD and neurotypical development. Three expert speech-language pathologists (SLPs) selected clips for the end and mid points of the scale and developed gold standard ratings. A total of 42 ASHA-certified SLPs with experience in treating children with ASD rated 20 of the audio clips at two time points. Twenty of the SLPs participated the online training prior to rating. Analyses were conducted using linear mixed-effects modeling, which were built using a research-question, theory-based modeling approach. Results indicated moderate levels of reliability, except for intra-rater reliability in the trained group, which was good (ICC = 0.76). The results also partially supported the validity of the scale; however, this prosody rating scale requires further study and development before wide use

Physical mechanisms may be as important as brain mechanisms in evolution of speech [Commentary on Ackerman, Hage, & Ziegler. Brain Mechanisms of acoustic communication in humans and nonhuman primates: an evolutionary perspective]

We present two arguments why physical adaptations for vocalization may be as important as neural adaptations. First, fine control over vocalization is not easy for physical reasons, and modern humans may be exceptional. Second, we present an example of a gorilla that shows rudimentary voluntary control over vocalization, indicating that some neural control is already shared with great apes

Brain mechanisms of acoustic communication in humans and nonhuman primates: An evolutionary perspective

Any account of “what is special about the human brain” (Passingham 2008) must specify the neural basis of our unique ability to produce speech and delineate how these remarkable motor capabilities could have emerged in our hominin ancestors. Clinical data suggest that the basal ganglia provide a platform for the integration of primate-general mechanisms of acoustic communication with the faculty of articulate speech in humans. Furthermore, neurobiological and paleoanthropological data point at a two-stage model of the phylogenetic evolution of this crucial prerequisite of spoken language: (i) monosynaptic refinement of the projections of motor cortex to the brainstem nuclei that steer laryngeal muscles, presumably, as part of a “phylogenetic trend” associated with increasing brain size during hominin evolution; (ii) subsequent vocal-laryngeal elaboration of cortico-basal ganglia circuitries, driven by human-specific FOXP2 mutations.;>This concept implies vocal continuity of spoken language evolution at the motor level, elucidating the deep entrenchment of articulate speech into a “nonverbal matrix” (Ingold 1994), which is not accounted for by gestural-origin theories. Moreover, it provides a solution to the question for the adaptive value of the “first word” (Bickerton 2009) since even the earliest and most simple verbal utterances must have increased the versatility of vocal displays afforded by the preceding elaboration of monosynaptic corticobulbar tracts, giving rise to enhanced social cooperation and prestige. At the ontogenetic level, the proposed model assumes age-dependent interactions between the basal ganglia and their cortical targets, similar to vocal learning in some songbirds. In this view, the emergence of articulate speech builds on the “renaissance” of an ancient organizational principle and, hence, may represent an example of “evolutionary tinkering” (Jacob 1977)