Porovnání vlivu segmentálních a prozodických manipulací na sílu cizineckého přízvuku a pocit srozumitelnosti

a klíčová slova Cílem této bakalářské práce je porovnat a prozkoumat vliv segmentálních a prozodických manipulací na sílu cizineckého přízvuku a pocit srozumitelnosti, a to prostřednictvím experimentálního výzkumu. Zvukové manipulace spočívají v odstranění chyb typických pro české mluvčí angličtiny, a tedy v teoretickém vylepšení jejich projevu. teoretické části jsou nejprve představeny dimenze, pomocí nichž lze popsat charakterizovat cizineckého přízvuku. Následující sekce se věnuje sociálním aspektům komunikace v řeči cizineckým přízvukem a diskriminaci, jíž nerodilí mluvčí mohou čelit. Další sekce teoretické části se zabývá popisem segmentálních a suprasegmentálních rysů, které jsou typické pro angličtinu, a jejich rolí v ání cizího jazyka. Mimoto jsou popsány také základní rysy tzv. české angličtiny, tedy rysy anglického projevu českého mluvčího. V empirické části této bakalářské práce se představuje metodologické pozadí celého výzkumu, tedy výběr materiálu, jeho segmentální a prozodické manipulace, příprava percepčního testu, jeho zadání a popis statistické analýzy dat. Výsledky jsou poté představeny v následující diskuzní části. Data získaná z odpovědí šedesáti osmi respondentů ukazují, že manipulace percepci řečového jevu nerodilých mluvčích ovlivňují, ale v různé míře. Síla cizineckého...and key words This thesis aims at comparing and investigating the effect of segmental and prosodic manipulations on speaker's accentedness and comprehensibility; experimental research is the chosen mode of investigation. The manipulations consist of the deletion of mistakes typically found in the speech of Czech speakers of English and of the theoretical improvement of their utterance. The theoretical part of this thesis introduces the three dimensions which are used for describing foreign-accented speech. The following section focuses on the social aspects of communicating in a non-native language with a foreign accent and on the discriminatory behavior that foreign speakers often face. The next section of the theoretical part presents a description of the most salient segmental and suprasegmental features of English, along with the role these features play in the acquisition of a foreign language. Characterization of Czech English is also introduced in this section. The empirical part of this thesis describes the methodology employed in this research; explanation of selection of material, its segmental and prosodic manipulations, the preparation of the perception test and the testing itself, and the description of the statistical analysis of the responses are all included in this section. The...Department of the English Language and ELT MethodologyÚstav anglického jazyka a didaktikyFaculty of ArtsFilozofická fakult

Comparing the effect of segmental and prosodic manipulations on speaker's accentedness and comprehensibility

and key words This thesis aims at comparing and investigating the effect of segmental and prosodic manipulations on speaker's accentedness and comprehensibility; experimental research is the chosen mode of investigation. The manipulations consist of the deletion of mistakes typically found in the speech of Czech speakers of English and of the theoretical improvement of their utterance. The theoretical part of this thesis introduces the three dimensions which are used for describing foreign-accented speech. The following section focuses on the social aspects of communicating in a non-native language with a foreign accent and on the discriminatory behavior that foreign speakers often face. The next section of the theoretical part presents a description of the most salient segmental and suprasegmental features of English, along with the role these features play in the acquisition of a foreign language. Characterization of Czech English is also introduced in this section. The empirical part of this thesis describes the methodology employed in this research; explanation of selection of material, its segmental and prosodic manipulations, the preparation of the perception test and the testing itself, and the description of the statistical analysis of the responses are all included in this section. The..

More than Words: Cross-Linguistic Exploration of Parkinson’s Disease Identification from Speech

This study investigates the effect of listeners’ first language and expertise on their perception of speech produced by people with Parkinson’s Disease (PD). We compared assessment scores and identification accuracy of expert and non-expert Czech and Dutch listeners on two tasks: perception of speech healthiness and recognition of sentence type intonation. We collected speech data from 30 Dutch speakers diagnosed with PD and 30 Dutch speaking healthy controls. Short phrases from intonation tasks and spontaneous monologues were used as stimuli in an online perception experiment. 40 people (20 expert and 20 non-expert listeners) participated. Results show that both expertise and language familiarity are important factors in perception of speech of people with PD, however differences in identification accuracy depend on the task type. In recognition of PD speech, there are prominent acoustic cues that trigger perception of “unhealthiness” in the non-expert listeners, while experience with phonetics may lead to a different focus in their perception of such cues. In intonation accuracy recognition, both Czech and Dutch expert groups outperform both non-expert groups, indicating the added value of phonetic experience for the prosodic task. Yet, there is a clear benefit for having Dutch as the first language for both tasks, as Dutch listeners performed more accurately in both healthiness and sentence type recognition tasks