Jaw Rotation in Dysarthria Measured With a Single Electromagnetic Articulography Sensor

Purpose This study evaluated a novel method for characterizing jaw rotation using orientation data from a single electromagnetic articulography sensor. This method was optimized for clinical application, and a preliminary examination of clinical feasibility and value was undertaken. Method The computational adequacy of the single-sensor orientation method was evaluated through comparisons of jaw-rotation histories calculated from dual-sensor positional data for 16 typical talkers. The clinical feasibility and potential value of single-sensor jaw rotation were assessed through comparisons of 7 talkers with dysarthria and 19 typical talkers in connected speech. Results The single-sensor orientation method allowed faster and safer participant preparation, required lower data-acquisition costs, and generated less high-frequency artifact than the dual-sensor positional approach. All talkers with dysarthria, regardless of severity, demonstrated jaw-rotation histories with more numerous changes in movement direction and reduced smoothness compared with typical talkers. Conclusions Results suggest that the single-sensor orientation method for calculating jaw rotation during speech is clinically feasible. Given the preliminary nature of this study and the small participant pool, the clinical value of such measures remains an open question. Further work must address the potential confound of reduced speaking rate on movement smoothness

How fluent is the fluent speech of people who stutter? A new approach to measuring kinematics with ultrasound

AM deposited 2020-06-22We present a new approach to the investigation of dynamic ultrasound tongue imaging (UTI) data, applied here to analyse the subtle aspects of the fluency of people who stutter (PWS). Fluent productions of CV syllables (C = /k/; V = /, i, /) from three PWS and three control speakers (PNS) were analysed for duration and peak velocity relative to articulatory movement towards (onset) and away from (offset) the consonantal closure. The objective was to apply a replicable methodology for kinematic investigation to speech of PWS in order to test Wingate's Fault-Line hypothesis. As was hypothesised, results show comparable onset behaviours for both groups. Regarding offsets, groups differ in peak velocity. Results suggest that PWS do not struggle initiating consonantal closure (onset). In transition from consonantal closure into the vowel, however, groups appear to employ different strategies expressed in increased variation (PNS) versus decreased mean peak velocity (PWS).casl30pub4219pub3-

Augev Method and an Innovative Use of Vocal Spectroscopy in Evaluating and Monitoring the Rehabilitation Path of Subjects Showing Severe Communication Pathologies

A strongly connotative element of developmental disorders (DS) is the total or partial impairment of verbal communication and, more generally, of social interaction. The method of Vocal-verb self-management (Augev) is a systemic organicistic method able to intervene in problems regarding verbal, spoken and written language development successfully. This study intends to demonstrate that it is possible to objectify these progresses through a spectrographic examination of vocal signals, which detects voice phonetic-acoustic parameters. This survey allows an objective evaluation of how effective an educational-rehabilitation intervention is. This study was performed on a population of 40 subjects (34 males and 6 females) diagnosed with developmental disorders (DS), specifically with a diagnosis of the autism spectrum disorders according to the DSM-5. The 40 subjects were treated in “la Comunicazione” centers, whose headquarters are near Bari, Brindisi and Rome. The results demonstrate a statistical significance in a correlation among the observed variables: supervisory status, attention, general dynamic coordination, understanding and execution of orders, performing simple unshielded rhythmic beats, word rhythm, oral praxies, phono-articulatory praxies, pronunciation of vowels, execution of graphemes, visual perception, acoustic perception, proprioceptive sensitivity, selective attention, short-term memory, segmental coordination, performance of simple rhythmic beatings, word rhythm, voice setting, intonation of sounds within a fifth, vowel pronunciation, consonant pronunciation, graphematic decoding, syllabic decoding, pronunciation of caudate syllables, coding of final syllable consonant, lexical decoding, phoneme-grapheme conversion, homographic grapheme decoding, homogeneous grapheme decoding, graphic stroke

AN ARTICULATORY-ACOUSTIC INVESTIGATION OF TIMING AND COORDINATION IN THE FLUENT SPEECH OF PEOPLE WHO STAMMER

This thesis investigates Wingate’s Fault-Line hypothesis (1988) which suggests that disfluencies in people who stammer (PWS) result from a deficit in transition from consonant to vowel (CV) thereby implying that stammering as a motor-control disorder would affect transitions even when not perceptually salient. To test this proposal, we explored the perceptually fluent speech of PWS using instrumental analysis (ultrasound and acoustic) to determine the underlying pervasiveness of disfluencies in this group as compared to people who do not stammer (PNS). Following fluency screening of recorded utterances, we applied acoustic and articulatory analysis techniques to perceptually fluent utterances of 9 PWS and 9 typical speakers in order to identify indicators of disfluency in the transition from syllable onsets to the following vowel. Measures of acoustic duration, locus equation and formant slope offer insights into timing and degree of coarticulation. The articulatory ultrasound tongue imaging technique moreover provides kinematic information of the tongue. A novel technique was applied to dynamically analyse and quantify the tongue kinematics in transition. This allowed us to treat the perceptually fluent speech of PWS as an ongoing time-situated process. Both acoustic and articulatory findings indicate by-group differences in timing, whereby PWS are overall slower and more variable in the execution of CV transitions when compared to typical speakers (PNS). The findings from both instrumental approaches also indicate differences in coordination, suggesting that PWS coarticulate to a lesser extent than PNS. Overall, these findings suggest that PWS exhibit a global deficit in CV transition that can be observed in perceptually fluent as well as stammered speech. This is in keeping with the predictions of Wingate’s Fault-Line hypothesis. iv The fact that the conclusions from the acoustic and articulatory measures are coherent, shows that acoustic measures may be sufficient to act as a proxy for articulatory measures

Cortical Dynamics of Language

The human capability for fluent speech profoundly directs inter-personal communication and, by extension, self-expression. Language is lost in millions of people each year due to trauma, stroke, neurodegeneration, and neoplasms with devastating impact to social interaction and quality of life. The following investigations were designed to elucidate the neurobiological foundation of speech production, building towards a universal cognitive model of language in the brain. Understanding the dynamical mechanisms supporting cortical network behavior will significantly advance the understanding of how both focal and disconnection injuries yield neurological deficits, informing the development of therapeutic approaches

MISPRONUNCIATION DETECTION AND DIAGNOSIS IN MANDARIN ACCENTED ENGLISH SPEECH

This work presents the development, implementation, and evaluation of a Mispronunciation Detection and Diagnosis (MDD) system, with application to pronunciation evaluation of Mandarin-accented English speech. A comprehensive detection and diagnosis of errors in the Electromagnetic Articulography corpus of Mandarin-Accented English (EMA-MAE) was performed by using the expert phonetic transcripts and an Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) system. Articulatory features derived from the parallel kinematic data available in the EMA-MAE corpus were used to identify the most significant articulatory error patterns seen in L2 speakers during common mispronunciations. Using both acoustic and articulatory information, an ASR based Mispronunciation Detection and Diagnosis (MDD) system was built and evaluated across different feature combinations and Deep Neural Network (DNN) architectures. The MDD system captured mispronunciation errors with a detection accuracy of 82.4%, a diagnostic accuracy of 75.8% and a false rejection rate of 17.2%. The results demonstrate the advantage of using articulatory features in revealing the significant contributors of mispronunciation as well as improving the performance of MDD systems

Static Palatography for Language Fieldwork

This article describes how to do static palatography, a way to collect articulatory records about speech sounds that can be used either in the field or in the laboratory. Palatography creates records of the contact pattern of the tongue on the roof of the mouth during an utterance, and when the actual dimensions of the palate are known, can be a rich source of data about articulatory strategies. This paper (1) instructs the reader about the tools and methods needed to collect palatograms (records of contact on the roof of the mouth) and linguograms (records of contact on the tongue); (2) shows how to collect three-dimensional information about the size and shape of a speaker’s hard palate; (3) illustrates how to incorporate these three types of records into life-size, anatomically accurate midsagittal diagrams of speakers’ articulations; and (4) demonstrates how palatograms can be measured (and how linguograms can be categorized) in order to statistically compare articulatory strategies across speech sounds and/or across speakers.National Foreign Language Resource Cente