438 research outputs found
The listening talker: A review of human and algorithmic context-induced modifications of speech
International audienceSpeech output technology is finding widespread application, including in scenarios where intelligibility might be compromised - at least for some listeners - by adverse conditions. Unlike most current algorithms, talkers continually adapt their speech patterns as a response to the immediate context of spoken communication, where the type of interlocutor and the environment are the dominant situational factors influencing speech production. Observations of talker behaviour can motivate the design of more robust speech output algorithms. Starting with a listener-oriented categorisation of possible goals for speech modification, this review article summarises the extensive set of behavioural findings related to human speech modification, identifies which factors appear to be beneficial, and goes on to examine previous computational attempts to improve intelligibility in noise. The review concludes by tabulating 46 speech modifications, many of which have yet to be perceptually or algorithmically evaluated. Consequently, the review provides a roadmap for future work in improving the robustness of speech output
Double Articulation Analyzer with Prosody for Unsupervised Word and Phoneme Discovery
Infants acquire words and phonemes from unsegmented speech signals using
segmentation cues, such as distributional, prosodic, and co-occurrence cues.
Many pre-existing computational models that represent the process tend to focus
on distributional or prosodic cues. This paper proposes a nonparametric
Bayesian probabilistic generative model called the prosodic hierarchical
Dirichlet process-hidden language model (Prosodic HDP-HLM). Prosodic HDP-HLM,
an extension of HDP-HLM, considers both prosodic and distributional cues within
a single integrative generative model. We conducted three experiments on
different types of datasets, and demonstrate the validity of the proposed
method. The results show that the Prosodic DAA successfully uses prosodic cues
and outperforms a method that solely uses distributional cues. The main
contributions of this study are as follows: 1) We develop a probabilistic
generative model for time series data including prosody that potentially has a
double articulation structure; 2) We propose the Prosodic DAA by deriving the
inference procedure for Prosodic HDP-HLM and show that Prosodic DAA can
discover words directly from continuous human speech signals using statistical
information and prosodic information in an unsupervised manner; 3) We show that
prosodic cues contribute to word segmentation more in naturally distributed
case words, i.e., they follow Zipf's law.Comment: 11 pages, Submitted to IEEE Transactions on Cognitive and
Developmental System
Children\u27s Sensitivity to Pitch Variation in Language
Children acquire consonant and vowel categories by 12 months, but take much longer to learn to interpret perceptible variation. This dissertation considers children’s interpretation of pitch variation. Pitch operates, often simultaneously, at different levels of linguistic structure. English-learning children must disregard pitch at the lexical level—since English is not a tone language—while still attending to pitch for its other functions. Chapters 1 and 5 outline the learning problem and suggest ways children might solve it. Chapter 2 demonstrates that 2.5-year-olds know pitch cannot differentiate words in English. Chapter 3 finds that not until age 4–5 do children correctly interpret pitch cues to emotions. Chapter 4 demonstrates some sensitivity between 2.5 and 5 years to the pitch cue to lexical stress, but continuing difficulties at the older ages. These findings suggest a late trajectory for interpretation of prosodic variation; throughout, I propose explanations for this protracted time-course
Categories, words and rules in language acquisition
Acquiring language requires learning a set of words (i.e. the lexicon) and abstract rules that combine them to form sentences (i.e. syntax). In this thesis, we show that infants acquiring their mother tongue rely on different speech categories to extract: words and to abstract regularities. We address this issue with a study that investigates how young infants use consonants and vowels, showing that certain computations are tuned to
one or the other of these speech categories..
Lexical and Prosodic Pitch Modifications in Cantonese Infant-directed Speech
Published online 03 February 2021The functions of acoustic-phonetic modifications in infant-directed speech (IDS) remain a
question: do they specifically serve to facilitate language learning via enhanced phonemic
contrasts (the hyperarticulation hypothesis) or primarily to improve communication via
prosodic exaggeration (the prosodic hypothesis)? The study of lexical tones provides a
unique opportunity to shed light on this, as lexical tones are phonemically contrastive,
yet their primary cue, pitch, is also a prosodic cue. This study investigated Cantonese
IDS and found increased intra-talker variation of lexical tones, which more likely posed
a challenge to rather than facilitated phonetic learning. Although tonal space was
expanded which could facilitate phonetic learning, its expansion was a function of
overall intonational modifications. Similar findings were observed in speech to pets
who should not benefit from larger phonemic distinction. We conclude that lexicaltone
adjustments in IDS mainly serve to broadly enhance communication rather than
specifically increase phonemic contrast for learners.This work was supported by the University Grants Committee (HKSAR) (RGC34000118), the Innovation and
Technology Fund (HKSAR) (ITS/067/18), Dr. Stanley Ho Medical Development Foundation, and the
Global Parent Child Resource Centre Limited. The second author’s work is supported by the Basque
Government through the BERC 2018-2021 program and by the Spanish Ministry of Science and
Innovation through the Ramon y Cajal Research Fellowship, PID2019-105528GA-I00
Voice Onset Time in Infant-directed Speech at Two Ages
Studies have reported differences between infant-directed speech (IDS) and adult-directed speech (ADS), suggesting that mothers adjust speech to their infants in ways that may help children process the incoming acoustical signal. One aspect of IDS that has been examined is clarification of voice onset time (VOT). Results have been inconsistent and many studies only report differences in VOT values rather than differences in amount of overlap between voiced and voiceless items. The present study examines 15 mothers' VOT in IDS at 7.5 months old and again at 11 months as compared to their VOT values in ADS. Words with initial stop consonants that occurred in IDS and ADS conditions were analyzed using PRAAT. Contrary to hypotheses, results show that VOT in IDS was less differentiated than VOT in ADS. Additionally, voiced items had significantly longer VOT in IDS than ADS, with no difference for voiceless items. Possible explanations are discussed
How tone, intonation and emotion shape the development of infants' fundamental frequency perception
Fundamental frequency (ƒ0), perceived as pitch, is the first and arguably most salient auditory component humans are exposed to since the beginning of life. It carries multiple linguistic (e.g., word meaning) and paralinguistic (e.g., speakers’ emotion) functions in speech and communication. The mappings between these functions and ƒ0 features vary within a language and differ cross-linguistically. For instance, a rising pitch can be perceived as a question in English but a lexical tone in Mandarin. Such variations mean that infants must learn the specific mappings based on their respective linguistic and social environments. To date, canonical theoretical frameworks and most empirical studies do not view or consider the multi-functionality of ƒ0, but typically focus on individual functions. More importantly, despite the eventual mastery of ƒ0 in communication, it is unclear how infants learn to decompose and recognize these overlapping functions carried by ƒ0. In this paper, we review the symbioses and synergies of the lexical, intonational, and emotional functions that can be carried by ƒ0 and are being acquired throughout infancy. On the basis of our review, we put forward the Learnability Hypothesis that infants decompose and acquire multiple ƒ0 functions through native/environmental experiences. Under this hypothesis, we propose representative cases such as the synergy scenario, where infants use visual cues to disambiguate and decompose the different ƒ0 functions. Further, viable ways to test the scenarios derived from this hypothesis are suggested across auditory and visual modalities. Discovering how infants learn to master the diverse functions carried by ƒ0 can increase our understanding of linguistic systems, auditory processing and communication functions
Are words easier to learn from infant- than adult-directed speech? A quantitative corpus-based investigation
We investigate whether infant-directed speech (IDS) could facilitate word
form learning when compared to adult-directed speech (ADS). To study this, we
examine the distribution of word forms at two levels, acoustic and
phonological, using a large database of spontaneous speech in Japanese. At the
acoustic level we show that, as has been documented before for phonemes, the
realizations of words are more variable and less discriminable in IDS than in
ADS. At the phonological level, we find an effect in the opposite direction:
the IDS lexicon contains more distinctive words (such as onomatopoeias) than
the ADS counterpart. Combining the acoustic and phonological metrics together
in a global discriminability score reveals that the bigger separation of
lexical categories in the phonological space does not compensate for the
opposite effect observed at the acoustic level. As a result, IDS word forms are
still globally less discriminable than ADS word forms, even though the effect
is numerically small. We discuss the implication of these findings for the view
that the functional role of IDS is to improve language learnability.Comment: Draf
Input quality and speech perception development in bilingual infants' first year of life
Epub 2021 Oct 20Individual differences in infants’ native phonological development have been
linked to the quantity and quality of infant-directed
speech (IDS). The effects of
parental and infant bilingualism on this relation in 131 five-and
nine-month-
old
monolingual and bilingual Spanish and Basque infants (72 male; 59 female; from
white middle-class
background) were investigated. Bilingualism did not affect the
developmental trajectory of infants’ native and non-native
speech perception and
the quality of maternal speech. In both language groups, vowel exaggeration in IDS
was significantly related to speech perception skills for 9-month-
olds
(r = −.30), but
not for 5-month-
olds.
This demonstrates that bilingual and monolingual caregivers
provide their infants with speech input that assists their task of learning the
phonological inventory of one or two languages.Eusko Jaurlaritza, Grant/Award Number:
BERC 2018-2021;
Severo Ochoa Excellence
Program, Grant/Award Number:
SEV-2015-
0490;
Ministerio de Ciencia
e Innovación, Grant/Award Number:
PID2019-105528GA-
I00;
H2020 Marie
Skłodowska-Curie
Actions, Grant/Award
Number: 79890
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