Sample records for accented mandarin speech
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Accentedness and intelligibility of Mandarin-accented English for Chinese, Koreans and Americans
DEFF Research Database (Denmark)
Hardman, Jocelyn
2014-01-01
English is used as a lingua franca not only throughout Asia, but also in Inner Circle countries for academic purposes. Due to wide variation in L2 English speech, however, mutual intelligibility is an increasing concern. Since accentedness does not necessarily correlate with intelligibility...... and results have been mixed as to the benefit of interlanguage match, a study focused on the academic context investigated the extent to which Mandarin-accented English was intelligible to L1 Mandarin listeners, as compared to Koreans and Americans, and whether intelligibility varied by talker segmental...... revealed that listener L1 and word familiarity were significant predictors of intelligibility, but that talker segmental production accuracy was not. A clear benefit for interlanguage match was found for the Mandarin L1 listeners with Mandarin-accented English as compared to the Korean listeners, however...
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Processing changes when listening to foreign-accented speech
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Carlos eRomero-Rivas
2015-03-01
Full Text Available This study investigates the mechanisms responsible for fast changes in processing foreign-accented speech. Event Related brain Potentials (ERPs were obtained while native speakers of Spanish listened to native and foreign-accented speakers of Spanish. We observed a less positive P200 component for foreign-accented speech relative to native speech comprehension. This suggests that the extraction of spectral information and other important acoustic features was hampered during foreign-accented speech comprehension. However, the amplitude of the N400 component for foreign-accented speech comprehension decreased across the experiment, suggesting the use of a higher level, lexical mechanism. Furthermore, during native speech comprehension, semantic violations in the critical words elicited an N400 effect followed by a late positivity. During foreign-accented speech comprehension, semantic violations only elicited an N400 effect. Overall, our results suggest that, despite a lack of improvement in phonetic discrimination, native listeners experience changes at lexical-semantic levels of processing after brief exposure to foreign-accented speech. Moreover, these results suggest that lexical access, semantic integration and linguistic re-analysis processes are permeable to external factors, such as the accent of the speaker.
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Xie, Xin; Theodore, Rachel M; Myers, Emily B
2017-01-01
The literature on perceptual learning for speech shows that listeners use lexical information to disambiguate phonetically ambiguous speech sounds and that they maintain this new mapping for later recognition of ambiguous sounds for a given talker. Evidence for this kind of perceptual reorganization has focused on phonetic category boundary shifts. Here, we asked whether listeners adjust both category boundaries and internal category structure in rapid adaptation to foreign accents. We investigated the perceptual learning of Mandarin-accented productions of word-final voiced stops in English. After exposure to a Mandarin speaker's productions, native-English listeners' adaptation to the talker was tested in 3 ways: a cross-modal priming task to assess spoken word recognition (Experiment 1), a category identification task to assess shifts in the phonetic boundary (Experiment 2), and a goodness rating task to assess internal category structure (Experiment 3). Following exposure, both category boundary and internal category structure were adjusted; moreover, these prelexical changes facilitated subsequent word recognition. Together, the results demonstrate that listeners' sensitivity to acoustic-phonetic detail in the accented input promoted a dynamic, comprehensive reorganization of their perceptual response as a consequence of exposure to the accented input. We suggest that an examination of internal category structure is important for a complete account of the mechanisms of perceptual learning. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved).
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Linguistic Processing of Accented Speech Across the Lifespan
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Alejandrina eCristia
2012-11-01
Full Text Available In most of the world, people have regular exposure to multiple accents. Therefore, learning to quickly process accented speech is a prerequisite to successful communication. In this paper, we examine work on the perception of accented speech across the lifespan, from early infancy to late adulthood. Unfamiliar accents initially impair linguistic processing by infants, children, younger adults, and older adults, but listeners of all ages come to adapt to accented speech. Emergent research also goes beyond these perceptual abilities, by assessing links with production and the relative contributions of linguistic knowledge and general cognitive skills. We conclude by underlining points of convergence across ages, and the gaps left to face in future work.
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Peng, Zhao Ellen
The current classroom acoustics standard (ANSI S12.60-2010) recommends core learning spaces not to exceed background noise level (BNL) of 35 dBA and reverberation time (RT) of 0.6 second, based on speech intelligibility performance mainly by the native English-speaking population. Existing literature has not correlated these recommended values well with student learning outcomes. With a growing population of non-native English speakers in American classrooms, the special needs for perceiving degraded speech among non-native listeners, either due to realistic room acoustics or talker foreign accent, have not been addressed in the current standard. This research seeks to investigate the effects of BNL and RT on the comprehension of English speech from native English and native Mandarin Chinese talkers as perceived by native and non-native English listeners, and to provide acoustic design guidelines to supplement the existing standard. This dissertation presents two studies on the effects of RT and BNL on more realistic classroom learning experiences. How do native and non-native English-speaking listeners perform on speech comprehension tasks under adverse acoustic conditions, if the English speech is produced by talkers of native English (Study 1) versus native Mandarin Chinese (Study 2)? Speech comprehension materials were played back in a listening chamber to individual listeners: native and non-native English-speaking in Study 1; native English, native Mandarin Chinese, and other non-native English-speaking in Study 2. Each listener was screened for baseline English proficiency level, and completed dual tasks simultaneously involving speech comprehension and adaptive dot-tracing under 15 acoustic conditions, comprised of three BNL conditions (RC-30, 40, and 50) and five RT scenarios (0.4 to 1.2 seconds). The results show that BNL and RT negatively affect both objective performance and subjective perception of speech comprehension, more severely for non
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Adapting to foreign-accented speech: The role of delay in testing
Witteman, M.J.; Bardhan, N.P.; Weber, A.C.; McQueen, J.M.
2011-01-01
Understanding speech usually seems easy, but it can become noticeably harder when the speaker has a foreign accent. This is because foreign accents add considerable variation to speech. Research on foreign-accented speech shows that participants are able to adapt quickly to this type of variation.
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The neural processing of foreign-accented speech and its relationship to listener bias
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Han-Gyol eYi
2014-10-01
Full Text Available Foreign-accented speech often presents a challenging listening condition. In addition to deviations from the target speech norms related to the inexperience of the nonnative speaker, listener characteristics may play a role in determining intelligibility levels. We have previously shown that an implicit visual bias for associating East Asian faces and foreignness predicts the listeners’ perceptual ability to process Korean-accented English audiovisual speech (Yi et al., 2013. Here, we examine the neural mechanism underlying the influence of listener bias to foreign faces on speech perception. In a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI study, native English speakers listened to native- and Korean-accented English sentences, with or without faces. The participants’ Asian-foreign association was measured using an implicit association test (IAT, conducted outside the scanner. We found that foreign-accented speech evoked greater activity in the bilateral primary auditory cortices and the inferior frontal gyri, potentially reflecting greater computational demand. Higher IAT scores, indicating greater bias, were associated with increased BOLD response to foreign-accented speech with faces in the primary auditory cortex, the early node for spectrotemporal analysis. We conclude the following: (1 foreign-accented speech perception places greater demand on the neural systems underlying speech perception; (2 face of the talker can exaggerate the perceived foreignness of foreign-accented speech; (3 implicit Asian-foreign association is associated with decreased neural efficiency in early spectrotemporal processing.
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Processing and Comprehension of Accented Speech by Monolingual and Bilingual Children
McDonald, Margarethe; Gross, Megan; Buac, Milijana; Batko, Michelle; Kaushanskaya, Margarita
2018-01-01
This study tested the effect of Spanish-accented speech on sentence comprehension in children with different degrees of Spanish experience. The hypothesis was that earlier acquisition of Spanish would be associated with enhanced comprehension of Spanish-accented speech. Three groups of 5-6-year-old children were tested: monolingual…
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Audiovisual cues benefit recognition of accented speech in noise but not perceptual adaptation.
Banks, Briony; Gowen, Emma; Munro, Kevin J; Adank, Patti
2015-01-01
Perceptual adaptation allows humans to recognize different varieties of accented speech. We investigated whether perceptual adaptation to accented speech is facilitated if listeners can see a speaker's facial and mouth movements. In Study 1, participants listened to sentences in a novel accent and underwent a period of training with audiovisual or audio-only speech cues, presented in quiet or in background noise. A control group also underwent training with visual-only (speech-reading) cues. We observed no significant difference in perceptual adaptation between any of the groups. To address a number of remaining questions, we carried out a second study using a different accent, speaker and experimental design, in which participants listened to sentences in a non-native (Japanese) accent with audiovisual or audio-only cues, without separate training. Participants' eye gaze was recorded to verify that they looked at the speaker's face during audiovisual trials. Recognition accuracy was significantly better for audiovisual than for audio-only stimuli; however, no statistical difference in perceptual adaptation was observed between the two modalities. Furthermore, Bayesian analysis suggested that the data supported the null hypothesis. Our results suggest that although the availability of visual speech cues may be immediately beneficial for recognition of unfamiliar accented speech in noise, it does not improve perceptual adaptation.
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Perception of Foreign Accent Syndrome Speech and Its Relation to Segmental Characteristics
Dankovicova, Jana; Hunt, Claire
2011-01-01
Foreign accent syndrome (FAS) is an acquired neurogenic disorder characterized by altered speech that sounds foreign-accented. This study presents a British subject perceived to speak with an Italian (or Greek) accent after a brainstem (pontine) stroke. Native English listeners rated the strength of foreign accent and impairment they perceived in…
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Recognizing speech in a novel accent: the motor theory of speech perception reframed.
Moulin-Frier, Clément; Arbib, Michael A
2013-08-01
The motor theory of speech perception holds that we perceive the speech of another in terms of a motor representation of that speech. However, when we have learned to recognize a foreign accent, it seems plausible that recognition of a word rarely involves reconstruction of the speech gestures of the speaker rather than the listener. To better assess the motor theory and this observation, we proceed in three stages. Part 1 places the motor theory of speech perception in a larger framework based on our earlier models of the adaptive formation of mirror neurons for grasping, and for viewing extensions of that mirror system as part of a larger system for neuro-linguistic processing, augmented by the present consideration of recognizing speech in a novel accent. Part 2 then offers a novel computational model of how a listener comes to understand the speech of someone speaking the listener's native language with a foreign accent. The core tenet of the model is that the listener uses hypotheses about the word the speaker is currently uttering to update probabilities linking the sound produced by the speaker to phonemes in the native language repertoire of the listener. This, on average, improves the recognition of later words. This model is neutral regarding the nature of the representations it uses (motor vs. auditory). It serve as a reference point for the discussion in Part 3, which proposes a dual-stream neuro-linguistic architecture to revisits claims for and against the motor theory of speech perception and the relevance of mirror neurons, and extracts some implications for the reframing of the motor theory.
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Does seeing an Asian face make speech sound more accented?
Zheng, Yi; Samuel, Arthur G
2017-08-01
Prior studies have reported that seeing an Asian face makes American English sound more accented. The current study investigates whether this effect is perceptual, or if it instead occurs at a later decision stage. We first replicated the finding that showing static Asian and Caucasian faces can shift people's reports about the accentedness of speech accompanying the pictures. When we changed the static pictures to dubbed videos, reducing the demand characteristics, the shift in reported accentedness largely disappeared. By including unambiguous items along with the original ambiguous items, we introduced a contrast bias and actually reversed the shift, with the Asian-face videos yielding lower judgments of accentedness than the Caucasian-face videos. By changing to a mixed rather than blocked design, so that the ethnicity of the videos varied from trial to trial, we eliminated the difference in accentedness rating. Finally, we tested participants' perception of accented speech using the selective adaptation paradigm. After establishing that an auditory-only accented adaptor shifted the perception of how accented test words are, we found that no such adaptation effect occurred when the adapting sounds relied on visual information (Asian vs. Caucasian videos) to influence the accentedness of an ambiguous auditory adaptor. Collectively, the results demonstrate that visual information can affect the interpretation, but not the perception, of accented speech.
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The role of training structure in perceptual learning of accented speech.
Tzeng, Christina Y; Alexander, Jessica E D; Sidaras, Sabrina K; Nygaard, Lynne C
2016-11-01
Foreign-accented speech contains multiple sources of variation that listeners learn to accommodate. Extending previous findings showing that exposure to high-variation training facilitates perceptual learning of accented speech, the current study examines to what extent the structure of training materials affects learning. During training, native adult speakers of American English transcribed sentences spoken in English by native Spanish-speaking adults. In Experiment 1, training stimuli were blocked by speaker, sentence, or randomized with respect to speaker and sentence (Variable training). At test, listeners transcribed novel English sentences produced by unfamiliar Spanish-accented speakers. Listeners' transcription accuracy was highest in the Variable condition, suggesting that varying both speaker identity and sentence across training trials enabled listeners to generalize their learning to novel speakers and linguistic content. Experiment 2 assessed the extent to which ordering of training tokens by a single factor, speaker intelligibility, would facilitate speaker-independent accent learning, finding that listeners' test performance did not reliably differ from that in the no-training control condition. Overall, these results suggest that the structure of training exposure, specifically trial-to-trial variation on both speaker's voice and linguistic content, facilitates learning of the systematic properties of accented speech. The current findings suggest a crucial role of training structure in optimizing perceptual learning. Beyond characterizing the types of variation listeners encode in their representations of spoken utterances, theories of spoken language processing should incorporate the role of training structure in learning lawful variation in speech. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved).
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The Mechanism of Speech Processing in Congenital Amusia: Evidence from Mandarin Speakers
Liu, Fang; Jiang, Cunmei; Thompson, William Forde; Xu, Yi; Yang, Yufang; Stewart, Lauren
2012-01-01
Congenital amusia is a neuro-developmental disorder of pitch perception that causes severe problems with music processing but only subtle difficulties in speech processing. This study investigated speech processing in a group of Mandarin speakers with congenital amusia. Thirteen Mandarin amusics and thirteen matched controls participated in a set of tone and intonation perception tasks and two pitch threshold tasks. Compared with controls, amusics showed impaired performance on word discrimin...
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The way you say it, the way I feel it: emotional word processing in accented speech
Hatzidaki, Anna; Baus, Cristina; Costa, Albert
2015-01-01
The present study examined whether processing words with affective connotations in a listener's native language may be modulated by accented speech. To address this question, we used the Event Related Potential (ERP) technique and recorded the cerebral activity of Spanish native listeners, who performed a semantic categorization task, while listening to positive, negative and neutral words produced in standard Spanish or in four foreign accents. The behavioral results yielded longer latencies for emotional than for neutral words in both native and foreign-accented speech, with no difference between positive and negative words. The electrophysiological results replicated previous findings from the emotional language literature, with the amplitude of the Late Positive Complex (LPC), associated with emotional language processing, being larger (more positive) for emotional than for neutral words at posterior scalp sites. Interestingly, foreign-accented speech was found to interfere with the processing of positive valence and go along with a negativity bias, possibly suggesting heightened attention to negative words. The manipulation employed in the present study provides an interesting perspective on the effects of accented speech on processing affective-laden information. It shows that higher order semantic processes that involve emotion-related aspects are sensitive to a speaker's accent. PMID:25870577
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The mechanism of speech processing in congenital amusia: evidence from Mandarin speakers.
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Fang Liu
Full Text Available Congenital amusia is a neuro-developmental disorder of pitch perception that causes severe problems with music processing but only subtle difficulties in speech processing. This study investigated speech processing in a group of Mandarin speakers with congenital amusia. Thirteen Mandarin amusics and thirteen matched controls participated in a set of tone and intonation perception tasks and two pitch threshold tasks. Compared with controls, amusics showed impaired performance on word discrimination in natural speech and their gliding tone analogs. They also performed worse than controls on discriminating gliding tone sequences derived from statements and questions, and showed elevated thresholds for pitch change detection and pitch direction discrimination. However, they performed as well as controls on word identification, and on statement-question identification and discrimination in natural speech. Overall, tasks that involved multiple acoustic cues to communicative meaning were not impacted by amusia. Only when the tasks relied mainly on pitch sensitivity did amusics show impaired performance compared to controls. These findings help explain why amusia only affects speech processing in subtle ways. Further studies on a larger sample of Mandarin amusics and on amusics of other language backgrounds are needed to consolidate these results.
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The mechanism of speech processing in congenital amusia: evidence from Mandarin speakers.
Liu, Fang; Jiang, Cunmei; Thompson, William Forde; Xu, Yi; Yang, Yufang; Stewart, Lauren
2012-01-01
Congenital amusia is a neuro-developmental disorder of pitch perception that causes severe problems with music processing but only subtle difficulties in speech processing. This study investigated speech processing in a group of Mandarin speakers with congenital amusia. Thirteen Mandarin amusics and thirteen matched controls participated in a set of tone and intonation perception tasks and two pitch threshold tasks. Compared with controls, amusics showed impaired performance on word discrimination in natural speech and their gliding tone analogs. They also performed worse than controls on discriminating gliding tone sequences derived from statements and questions, and showed elevated thresholds for pitch change detection and pitch direction discrimination. However, they performed as well as controls on word identification, and on statement-question identification and discrimination in natural speech. Overall, tasks that involved multiple acoustic cues to communicative meaning were not impacted by amusia. Only when the tasks relied mainly on pitch sensitivity did amusics show impaired performance compared to controls. These findings help explain why amusia only affects speech processing in subtle ways. Further studies on a larger sample of Mandarin amusics and on amusics of other language backgrounds are needed to consolidate these results.
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Processing melodic contour and speech intonation in congenital amusics with Mandarin Chinese.
Jiang, Cunmei; Hamm, Jeff P; Lim, Vanessa K; Kirk, Ian J; Yang, Yufang
2010-07-01
Congenital amusia is a disorder in the perception and production of musical pitch. It has been suggested that early exposure to a tonal language may compensate for the pitch disorder (Peretz, 2008). If so, it is reasonable to expect that there would be different characterizations of pitch perception in music and speech in congenital amusics who speak a tonal language, such as Mandarin. In this study, a group of 11 adults with amusia whose first language was Mandarin were tested with melodic contour and speech intonation discrimination and identification tasks. The participants with amusia were impaired in discriminating and identifying melodic contour. These abnormalities were also detected in identifying both speech and non-linguistic analogue derived patterns for the Mandarin intonation tasks. In addition, there was an overall trend for the participants with amusia to show deficits with respect to controls in the intonation discrimination tasks for both speech and non-linguistic analogues. These findings suggest that the amusics' melodic pitch deficits may extend to the perception of speech, and could potentially result in some language deficits in those who speak a tonal language. Copyright (c) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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Dysarthria in Mandarin-Speaking Children with Cerebral Palsy: Speech Subsystem Profiles
Chen, Li-Mei; Hustad, Katherine C.; Kent, Ray D.; Lin, Yu Ching
2018-01-01
Purpose: This study explored the speech characteristics of Mandarin-speaking children with cerebral palsy (CP) and typically developing (TD) children to determine (a) how children in the 2 groups may differ in their speech patterns and (b) the variables correlated with speech intelligibility for words and sentences. Method: Data from 6 children…
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Malaysian University Students’ Attitudes towards Six Varieties of Accented Speech in English
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Zainab Thamer Ahmed
2014-10-01
Full Text Available Previous language attitude studies indicated that in many countries all over the world, English language learners perceived native accents either American or British, more positively than the non-native accents such as the Japanese, Korean, and Austrian accents. However, in Malaysia it is still unclear which accent Malaysian learners of English tend to perceive more positively (Pillai 2009. The verbal-guise technique and accent recognition item were adopted as indirect and direct instruments in gathering data to obtain data to clarify the inquiry. The sample includes 120 Malaysian university students and they were immersed in several speech accent situations to elicit feedback on their perceptions. Essentially two research questions are addressed: 1 What are Malaysian university students’ attitudes toward native and non-native English accents? 2 How familiar are students with accents? The results indicated that the students had a bias towards in-group accent, meaning that they evaluated non-native lecturers’ accents more positively. These results supported the ‘social identity theory’ consistent with many previous language attitude studies of this nature. The Malaysian students were seen to be able to distinguish between native and non-native accents although there was much confusion between British and American accents.
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Accentedness and intelligibility: Mandarin-accented English for Korean and American listeners
DEFF Research Database (Denmark)
Hardman, Jocelyn
.S. who were certified to teach at the university level, and the key words were highly familiar to native speakers of English, those words which matched exactly were scored as accurate, while those which did not were marked as inaccurate. In addition, the listeners rated their familiarity with known key...... words on an increasing 5-point Likert scale, while unknown words were entered as ‘0.’. A series of mixed effects models with logistic regression analyzed the effect of speaker segmental production accuracy and listener word familiarity on intelligibility. Individual speaker and listener variation......, as well as key word variation, were crossed as random effects. For the Koreans, Mandarin-accented English was significantly less intelligible than for the Americans and the differences in the segments that most frequently caused problems for each L1 listener group lend evidence to the strong role played...
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Accent Attribution in Speakers with Foreign Accent Syndrome
Verhoeven, Jo; De Pauw, Guy; Pettinato, Michele; Hirson, Allen; Van Borsel, John; Marien, Peter
2013-01-01
Purpose: The main aim of this experiment was to investigate the perception of Foreign Accent Syndrome in comparison to speakers with an authentic foreign accent. Method: Three groups of listeners attributed accents to conversational speech samples of 5 FAS speakers which were embedded amongst those of 5 speakers with a real foreign accent and 5…
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Tao, Duoduo; Deng, Rui; Jiang, Ye; Galvin, John J; Fu, Qian-Jie; Chen, Bing
2014-01-01
To investigate how auditory working memory relates to speech perception performance by Mandarin-speaking cochlear implant (CI) users. Auditory working memory and speech perception was measured in Mandarin-speaking CI and normal-hearing (NH) participants. Working memory capacity was measured using forward digit span and backward digit span; working memory efficiency was measured using articulation rate. Speech perception was assessed with: (a) word-in-sentence recognition in quiet, (b) word-in-sentence recognition in speech-shaped steady noise at +5 dB signal-to-noise ratio, (c) Chinese disyllable recognition in quiet, (d) Chinese lexical tone recognition in quiet. Self-reported school rank was also collected regarding performance in schoolwork. There was large inter-subject variability in auditory working memory and speech performance for CI participants. Working memory and speech performance were significantly poorer for CI than for NH participants. All three working memory measures were strongly correlated with each other for both CI and NH participants. Partial correlation analyses were performed on the CI data while controlling for demographic variables. Working memory efficiency was significantly correlated only with sentence recognition in quiet when working memory capacity was partialled out. Working memory capacity was correlated with disyllable recognition and school rank when efficiency was partialled out. There was no correlation between working memory and lexical tone recognition in the present CI participants. Mandarin-speaking CI users experience significant deficits in auditory working memory and speech performance compared with NH listeners. The present data suggest that auditory working memory may contribute to CI users' difficulties in speech understanding. The present pattern of results with Mandarin-speaking CI users is consistent with previous auditory working memory studies with English-speaking CI users, suggesting that the lexical importance
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Perception of foreign-accented clear speech by younger and older English listeners
Li, Chi-Nin
2009-01-01
Naturally produced English clear speech has been shown to be more intelligible than English conversational speech. However, little is known about the extent of the clear speech effects in the production of nonnative English, and perception of foreign-accented English by younger and older listeners. The present study examined whether Cantonese speakers would employ the same strategies as those used by native English speakers in producing clear speech in their second language. Also, the clear s...
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Can You Understand Me? Speaking Robots and Accented Speech
Moussalli, Souheila; Cardoso, Walcir
2017-01-01
The results of our previous research on the pedagogical use of Speaking Robots (SRs) revealed positive effects on motivating students to practice their oral skills in a stress-free environment. However, our findings indicated that the SR was sometimes unable to understand students' foreign accented speech. In this paper, we report the results of a…
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Indian accent text-to-speech system for web browsing
Indian Academy of Sciences (India)
This paper describes a 'web reader' which 'reads out' the textual contents of a selected web page in Hindi or in English with Indian accent. The content of the page is downloaded and parsed into suitable textual form. It is then passed on to an indigenously developed text-to-speech system for Hindi/Indian English, ...
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The common denominator in the perception of accents in cases with foreign accent syndrome
Jonkers, Roel; van der Scheer, Fennetta; Gilbers, Dicky
2017-01-01
Background: Foreign accent syndrome (FAS) is a rare speech disorder leading to a perceived presence of a new accent in a speaker’s speech. Until now, around 100 cases of FAS have been reported. It is striking that in most cases the perception of the accent is in one consistent direction, namely from
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Comparison of Classification Methods for Detecting Emotion from Mandarin Speech
Pao, Tsang-Long; Chen, Yu-Te; Yeh, Jun-Heng
It is said that technology comes out from humanity. What is humanity? The very definition of humanity is emotion. Emotion is the basis for all human expression and the underlying theme behind everything that is done, said, thought or imagined. Making computers being able to perceive and respond to human emotion, the human-computer interaction will be more natural. Several classifiers are adopted for automatically assigning an emotion category, such as anger, happiness or sadness, to a speech utterance. These classifiers were designed independently and tested on various emotional speech corpora, making it difficult to compare and evaluate their performance. In this paper, we first compared several popular classification methods and evaluated their performance by applying them to a Mandarin speech corpus consisting of five basic emotions, including anger, happiness, boredom, sadness and neutral. The extracted feature streams contain MFCC, LPCC, and LPC. The experimental results show that the proposed WD-MKNN classifier achieves an accuracy of 81.4% for the 5-class emotion recognition and outperforms other classification techniques, including KNN, MKNN, DW-KNN, LDA, QDA, GMM, HMM, SVM, and BPNN. Then, to verify the advantage of the proposed method, we compared these classifiers by applying them to another Mandarin expressive speech corpus consisting of two emotions. The experimental results still show that the proposed WD-MKNN outperforms others.
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Yang, Wu-xia; Feng, Jie; Huang, Wan-ting; Zhang, Cheng-xiang; Nan, Yun
2014-01-01
Congenital amusia is a musical disorder that mainly affects pitch perception. Among Mandarin speakers, some amusics also have difficulties in processing lexical tones (tone agnosics). To examine to what extent these perceptual deficits may be related to pitch production impairments in music and Mandarin speech, eight amusics, eight tone agnosics, and 12 age- and IQ-matched normal native Mandarin speakers were asked to imitate music note sequences and Mandarin words of comparable lengths. The results indicated that both the amusics and tone agnosics underperformed the controls on musical pitch production. However, tone agnosics performed no worse than the amusics, suggesting that lexical tone perception deficits may not aggravate musical pitch production difficulties. Moreover, these three groups were all able to imitate lexical tones with perfect intelligibility. Taken together, the current study shows that perceptual musical pitch and lexical tone deficits might coexist with musical pitch production difficulties. But at the same time these perceptual pitch deficits might not affect lexical tone production or the intelligibility of the speech words that were produced. The perception-production relationship for pitch among individuals with perceptual pitch deficits may be, therefore, domain-dependent. PMID:24474944
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Wu-xia eYang
2014-01-01
Full Text Available Congenital amusia is a musical disorder that mainly affects pitch perception. Among Mandarin speakers, some amusics also have difficulties in processing lexical tones (tone agnosics. To examine to what extent these perceptual deficits may be related to pitch production impairments in music and Mandarin speech, 8 amusics, 8 tone agnosics, and 12 age- and IQ-matched normal native Mandarin speakers were asked to imitate music note sequences and Mandarin words of comparable lengths. The results indicated that both the amusics and tone agnosics underperformed the controls on musical pitch production. However, tone agnosics performed no worse than the amusics, suggesting that lexical tone perception deficits may not aggravate musical pitch production difficulties. Moreover, these three groups were all able to imitate lexical tones with perfect intelligibility. Taken together, the current study shows that perceptual musical pitch and lexical tone deficits might coexist with musical pitch production difficulties. But at the same time these perceptual pitch deficits might not affect lexical tone production or the intelligibility of the speech words that were produced. The perception-production relationship for pitch among individuals with perceptual pitch deficits may be, therefore, domain-dependent.
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Brain Plasticity in Speech Training in Native English Speakers Learning Mandarin Tones
Heinzen, Christina Carolyn
The current study employed behavioral and event-related potential (ERP) measures to investigate brain plasticity associated with second-language (L2) phonetic learning based on an adaptive computer training program. The program utilized the acoustic characteristics of Infant-Directed Speech (IDS) to train monolingual American English-speaking listeners to perceive Mandarin lexical tones. Behavioral identification and discrimination tasks were conducted using naturally recorded speech, carefully controlled synthetic speech, and non-speech control stimuli. The ERP experiments were conducted with selected synthetic speech stimuli in a passive listening oddball paradigm. Identical pre- and post- tests were administered on nine adult listeners, who completed two-to-three hours of perceptual training. The perceptual training sessions used pair-wise lexical tone identification, and progressed through seven levels of difficulty for each tone pair. The levels of difficulty included progression in speaker variability from one to four speakers and progression through four levels of acoustic exaggeration of duration, pitch range, and pitch contour. Behavioral results for the natural speech stimuli revealed significant training-induced improvement in identification of Tones 1, 3, and 4. Improvements in identification of Tone 4 generalized to novel stimuli as well. Additionally, comparison between discrimination of across-category and within-category stimulus pairs taken from a synthetic continuum revealed a training-induced shift toward more native-like categorical perception of the Mandarin lexical tones. Analysis of the Mismatch Negativity (MMN) responses in the ERP data revealed increased amplitude and decreased latency for pre-attentive processing of across-category discrimination as a result of training. There were also laterality changes in the MMN responses to the non-speech control stimuli, which could reflect reallocation of brain resources in processing pitch patterns
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Zhang, Linjun; Li, Yu; Wu, Han; Li, Xin; Shu, Hua; Zhang, Yang; Li, Ping
2016-01-01
Speech recognition by second language (L2) learners in optimal and suboptimal conditions has been examined extensively with English as the target language in most previous studies. This study extended existing experimental protocols (Wang et al., 2013) to investigate Mandarin speech recognition by Japanese learners of Mandarin at two different levels (elementary vs. intermediate) of proficiency. The overall results showed that in addition to L2 proficiency, semantic context, F0 contours, and listening condition all affected the recognition performance on the Mandarin sentences. However, the effects of semantic context and F0 contours on L2 speech recognition diverged to some extent. Specifically, there was significant modulation effect of listening condition on semantic context, indicating that L2 learners made use of semantic context less efficiently in the interfering background than in quiet. In contrast, no significant modulation effect of listening condition on F0 contours was found. Furthermore, there was significant interaction between semantic context and F0 contours, indicating that semantic context becomes more important for L2 speech recognition when F0 information is degraded. None of these effects were found to be modulated by L2 proficiency. The discrepancy in the effects of semantic context and F0 contours on L2 speech recognition in the interfering background might be related to differences in processing capacities required by the two types of information in adverse listening conditions.
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Chen, Jing; Yang, Hongying; Wu, Xihong; Moore, Brian C J
2018-02-01
In Mandarin Chinese, the fundamental frequency (F0) contour defines lexical "Tones" that differ in meaning despite being phonetically identical. Flattening the F0 contour impairs the intelligibility of Mandarin Chinese in background sounds. This might occur because the flattening introduces misleading lexical information. To avoid this effect, two types of speech were used: single-Tone speech contained Tones 1 and 0 only, which have a flat F0 contour; multi-Tone speech contained all Tones and had a varying F0 contour. The intelligibility of speech in steady noise was slightly better for single-Tone speech than for multi-Tone speech. The intelligibility of speech in a two-talker masker, with the difference in mean F0 between the target and masker matched across conditions, was worse for the multi-Tone target in the multi-Tone masker than for any other combination of target and masker, probably because informational masking was maximal for this combination. The introduction of a perceived spatial separation between the target and masker, via the precedence effect, led to better performance for all target-masker combinations, especially the multi-Tone target in the multi-Tone masker. In summary, a flat F0 contour does not reduce the intelligibility of Mandarin Chinese when the introduction of misleading lexical cues is avoided.
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Hong Zhou
2017-06-01
Full Text Available The goal of this developmental speech perception study was to assess whether and how age group modulated the influences of high-level semantic context and low-level fundamental frequency (F0 contours on the recognition of Mandarin speech by elementary and middle-school-aged children in quiet and interference backgrounds. The results revealed different patterns for semantic and F0 information. One the one hand, age group modulated significantly the use of F0 contours, indicating that elementary school children relied more on natural F0 contours than middle school children during Mandarin speech recognition. On the other hand, there was no significant modulation effect of age group on semantic context, indicating that children of both age groups used semantic context to assist speech recognition to a similar extent. Furthermore, the significant modulation effect of age group on the interaction between F0 contours and semantic context revealed that younger children could not make better use of semantic context in recognizing speech with flat F0 contours compared with natural F0 contours, while older children could benefit from semantic context even when natural F0 contours were altered, thus confirming the important role of F0 contours in Mandarin speech recognition by elementary school children. The developmental changes in the effects of high-level semantic and low-level F0 information on speech recognition might reflect the differences in auditory and cognitive resources associated with processing of the two types of information in speech perception.
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Lim, Hui W; Wells, Bill; Howard, Sara
2015-01-01
Early child multilingual acquisition is under-explored. Using a cross-sectional study approach, the present research investigates the rate of multilingual phonological acquisition of English-Mandarin-Malay by 64 ethnic Chinese children aged 2;06-4;05 in Malaysia--a multiracial-multilingual country of Asia. The aims of the study are to provide clinical norms for speech development in the multilingual children and to compare multilingual acquisition with monolingual and bilingual acquisition. An innovative multilingual phonological test which adopts well-defined scoring criteria drawing upon local accents of English, Mandarin and Malay is proposed and described in this article. This procedure has been neglected in the few existing Chinese bilingual phonological acquisition studies resulting in peculiar findings. The multilingual children show comparable phonological acquisition milestones to that of monolingual and bilingual peers acquiring the same languages. The implications of the present results are discussed. The present findings contribute to the development of models and theories of child multilingual acquisition.
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Chih-Hung Chien
2006-01-01
Conclusion: This study established the agreement between Mandarin SRTs and PTTs in the low tone area of speech frequencies in the geriatric population. In clinical settings, SRT test can be rapidly and easily performed and is relatively inexpensive. It is a vital indicator of the accuracy of PTT measurement.
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Cheng, Xiaoting; Liu, Yangwenyi; Shu, Yilai; Tao, Duo-Duo; Wang, Bing; Yuan, Yasheng; Galvin, John J; Fu, Qian-Jie; Chen, Bing
2018-01-01
Due to limited spectral resolution, cochlear implants (CIs) do not convey pitch information very well. Pitch cues are important for perception of music and tonal language; it is possible that music training may improve performance in both listening tasks. In this study, we investigated music training outcomes in terms of perception of music, lexical tones, and sentences in 22 young (4.8 to 9.3 years old), prelingually deaf Mandarin-speaking CI users. Music perception was measured using a melodic contour identification (MCI) task. Speech perception was measured for lexical tones and sentences presented in quiet. Subjects received 8 weeks of MCI training using pitch ranges not used for testing. Music and speech perception were measured at 2, 4, and 8 weeks after training was begun; follow-up measures were made 4 weeks after training was stopped. Mean baseline performance was 33.2%, 76.9%, and 45.8% correct for MCI, lexical tone recognition, and sentence recognition, respectively. After 8 weeks of MCI training, mean performance significantly improved by 22.9, 14.4, and 14.5 percentage points for MCI, lexical tone recognition, and sentence recognition, respectively ( p music and speech performance. The results suggest that music training can significantly improve pediatric Mandarin-speaking CI users' music and speech perception.
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Shu-Yu Liu
Full Text Available (1 To evaluate the recognition of words, phonemes and lexical tones in audiovisual (AV and auditory-only (AO modes in Mandarin-speaking adults with cochlear implants (CIs; (2 to understand the effect of presentation levels on AV speech perception; (3 to learn the effect of hearing experience on AV speech perception.Thirteen deaf adults (age = 29.1±13.5 years; 8 male, 5 female who had used CIs for >6 months and 10 normal-hearing (NH adults participated in this study. Seven of them were prelingually deaf, and 6 postlingually deaf. The Mandarin Monosyllablic Word Recognition Test was used to assess recognition of words, phonemes and lexical tones in AV and AO conditions at 3 presentation levels: speech detection threshold (SDT, speech recognition threshold (SRT and 10 dB SL (re:SRT.The prelingual group had better phoneme recognition in the AV mode than in the AO mode at SDT and SRT (both p = 0.016, and so did the NH group at SDT (p = 0.004. Mode difference was not noted in the postlingual group. None of the groups had significantly different tone recognition in the 2 modes. The prelingual and postlingual groups had significantly better phoneme and tone recognition than the NH one at SDT in the AO mode (p = 0.016 and p = 0.002 for phonemes; p = 0.001 and p<0.001 for tones but were outperformed by the NH group at 10 dB SL (re:SRT in both modes (both p<0.001 for phonemes; p<0.001 and p = 0.002 for tones. The recognition scores had a significant correlation with group with age and sex controlled (p<0.001.Visual input may help prelingually deaf implantees to recognize phonemes but may not augment Mandarin tone recognition. The effect of presentation level seems minimal on CI users' AV perception. This indicates special considerations in developing audiological assessment protocols and rehabilitation strategies for implantees who speak tonal languages.
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Kim, Soo Ji; Jo, Uiri
2013-01-01
Based on the anatomical and functional commonality between singing and speech, various types of musical elements have been employed in music therapy research for speech rehabilitation. This study was to develop an accent-based music speech protocol to address voice problems of stroke patients with mixed dysarthria. Subjects were 6 stroke patients with mixed dysarthria and they received individual music therapy sessions. Each session was conducted for 30 minutes and 12 sessions including pre- and post-test were administered for each patient. For examining the protocol efficacy, the measures of maximum phonation time (MPT), fundamental frequency (F0), average intensity (dB), jitter, shimmer, noise to harmonics ratio (NHR), and diadochokinesis (DDK) were compared between pre and post-test and analyzed with a paired sample t-test. The results showed that the measures of MPT, F0, dB, and sequential motion rates (SMR) were significantly increased after administering the protocol. Also, there were statistically significant differences in the measures of shimmer, and alternating motion rates (AMR) of the syllable /K$\\inve$/ between pre- and post-test. The results indicated that the accent-based music speech protocol may improve speech motor coordination including respiration, phonation, articulation, resonance, and prosody of patients with dysarthria. This suggests the possibility of utilizing the music speech protocol to maximize immediate treatment effects in the course of a long-term treatment for patients with dysarthria.
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DEFF Research Database (Denmark)
Wang, Lei; Sloos, Marjoleine 莱娜; Zhang, Chun
In search for a linguistic basis for the education of Chinese as a foreign language CFL in Denmark, we set up a new line of investigation into CFL. This research focuses on the phonetics and phonology of Mandarin Chinese as compared to Danish. Considering the sound systems of both languages, we......-ba /pha pa/ ta-da /tha ta/ ka-ga / kha-ka/ For L2 acquisition it is held that same and new phonemes are (relatively) easy acquired, whereas similar but not identical sounds are difficult to learn. New sounds are initially mapped onto the L1 phoneme inventory (Kuhl 1991). For Danish, this would predict...... instruction, which pitch contours do the Danish learners of Chinese use on neutral tones and to what extent does their production match that of native speakers? Future research may include Norwegian and Swedish-accented Chinese and a comparison between the different Germanic accents of CFL. Reference Kuhl, P...
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Harrison N. Jones
2011-01-01
Full Text Available Multiple reports have described patients with disordered articulation and prosody, often following acute aphasia, dysarthria, or apraxia of speech, which results in the perception by listeners of a foreign-like accent. These features led to the term foreign accent syndrome (FAS, a speech disorder with perceptual features that suggest an indistinct, non-native speaking accent. Also correctly known as psuedoforeign accent, the speech does not typically match a specific foreign accent, but is rather a constellation of speech features that result in the perception of a foreign accent by listeners. The primary etiologies of FAS are cerebrovascular accidents or traumatic brain injuries which affect cortical and subcortical regions critical to expressive speech and language production. Far fewer cases of FAS associated with psychiatric conditions have been reported. We will present the clinical history, neurological examination, neuropsychological assessment, cognitive-behavioral and biofeedback assessments, and motor speech examination of a patient with FAS without a known vascular, traumatic, or infectious precipitant. Repeated multidisciplinary examinations of this patient provided convergent evidence in support of FAS secondary to conversion disorder. We discuss these findings and their implications for evaluation and treatment of rare neurological and psychiatric conditions.
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Mengru Han
2018-04-01
Full Text Available Tonal information is essential to early word learning in tone languages. Although numerous studies have investigated the intonational and segmental properties of infant-directed speech (IDS, only a few studies have explored the properties of lexical tones in IDS. These studies mostly focused on the first year of life; thus little is known about how lexical tones in IDS change as children’s vocabulary acquisition accelerates in the second year (Goldfield and Reznick, 1990; Bloom, 2001. The present study examines whether Mandarin Chinese mothers hyperarticulate lexical tones in IDS addressing 18- and 24-month-old children—at which age children are learning words at a rapid speed—vs. adult-directed speech (ADS. Thirty-nine Mandarin Chinese–speaking mothers were tested in a semi-spontaneous picture-book-reading task, in which they told the same story to their child (IDS condition and to an adult (ADS condition. Results for the F0 measurements (minimum F0, maximum F0, and F0 range of tone in the speech data revealed a continuum of differences among IDS addressing 18-month-olds, IDS addressing 24-month-olds, and ADS. Lexical tones in IDS addressing 18-month-old children had a higher minimum F0, higher maximum F0, and larger pitch range than lexical tones in ADS. Lexical tones in IDS addressing 24-month-old children showed more similarity to ADS tones with respect to pitch height: there were no differences in minimum F0 and maximum F0 between ADS and IDS. However, F0 range was still larger. These results suggest that lexical tones are generally hyperarticulated in Mandarin Chinese IDS addressing 18- and 24- month-old children despite the change in pitch level over time. Mandarin Chinese mothers hyperarticulate lexical tones in IDS when talking to toddlers and potentially facilitate tone acquisition and word learning.
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Bruce, Carolyn; To, Cinn-Teng; Newton, Caroline
2012-01-01
This study explored whether an unfamiliar non-native accent, differing in both segmental and prosodic features was more difficult for individuals with aphasia to understand than an unfamiliar native accent, which differed in segmental features only. Comprehension, which was determined by accuracy judgments on true/false sentences, and speed of response were assessed in the following three conditions: a familiar Southern Standard British English (SSBE) accent, an unfamiliar native Grimsby accent, and an unfamiliar non-native Chinese accent. Thirty-four English speaking adults (17 people with and 17 people without aphasia) served as listeners for this study. All listeners made significantly more errors in the unfamiliar non-native accent, although this difficulty was more marked for those with aphasia. While there was no affect of speaker accent on the response times of listeners with aphasia, listeners without aphasia were significantly slower with the unfamiliar non-native accent. The results indicate that non-native accented speech affects comprehension even on simple tasks in ideal listening conditions. The findings suggest that speaker accent, especially accents varying in both segmental and prosodic features, can be a barrier to successful interactions between non-native accented speakers and native listeners, particularly those with aphasia.
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Mandarin speech perception in combined electric and acoustic stimulation.
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Yongxin Li
Full Text Available For deaf individuals with residual low-frequency acoustic hearing, combined use of a cochlear implant (CI and hearing aid (HA typically provides better speech understanding than with either device alone. Because of coarse spectral resolution, CIs do not provide fundamental frequency (F0 information that contributes to understanding of tonal languages such as Mandarin Chinese. The HA can provide good representation of F0 and, depending on the range of aided acoustic hearing, first and second formant (F1 and F2 information. In this study, Mandarin tone, vowel, and consonant recognition in quiet and noise was measured in 12 adult Mandarin-speaking bimodal listeners with the CI-only and with the CI+HA. Tone recognition was significantly better with the CI+HA in noise, but not in quiet. Vowel recognition was significantly better with the CI+HA in quiet, but not in noise. There was no significant difference in consonant recognition between the CI-only and the CI+HA in quiet or in noise. There was a wide range in bimodal benefit, with improvements often greater than 20 percentage points in some tests and conditions. The bimodal benefit was compared to CI subjects' HA-aided pure-tone average (PTA thresholds between 250 and 2000 Hz; subjects were divided into two groups: "better" PTA (50 dB HL. The bimodal benefit differed significantly between groups only for consonant recognition. The bimodal benefit for tone recognition in quiet was significantly correlated with CI experience, suggesting that bimodal CI users learn to better combine low-frequency spectro-temporal information from acoustic hearing with temporal envelope information from electric hearing. Given the small number of subjects in this study (n = 12, further research with Chinese bimodal listeners may provide more information regarding the contribution of acoustic and electric hearing to tonal language perception.
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Marcelo L Berthier
2016-08-01
Full Text Available Foreign accent syndrome (FAS is a speech disorder that is defined by the emergence of a peculiar manner of articulation and intonation which is perceived as foreign. In most cases of acquired FAS (AFAS the new accent is secondary to small focal lesions involving components of the bilaterally distributed neural network for speech production. In the past few years FAS has also been described in different psychiatric conditions (conversion disorder, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia as well as in developmental disorders (specific language impairment, apraxia of speech. In the present study, two adult males, one with atypical phonetic production and the other one with cluttering, reported having developmental FAS (DFAS since their adolescence. Perceptual analysis by naïve judges could not confirm the presence of foreign accent, possibly due to the mildness of the speech disorder. However, detailed linguistic analysis provided evidence of prosodic and segmental errors previously reported in AFAS cases. Cognitive testing showed reduced communication in activities of daily living and mild deficits related to psychiatric disorders. Psychiatric evaluation revealed long-lasting internalizing disorders (neuroticism, anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder, social phobia, depression, alexithymia, hopelessness, and apathy in both subjects. Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI data from each subject with DFAS were compared with data from a group of 21 age- and gender-matched healthy control subjects. Diffusion parameters (MD, AD, and RD in predefined regions of interest showed changes of white matter microstructure in regions previously related with AFAS and psychiatric disorders. In conclusion, the present findings militate against the possibility that these two subjects have FAS of psychogenic origin. Rather, our findings provide evidence that mild DFAS occurring in the context of subtle, yet persistent, developmental speech disorders may be associated with
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Grohe, Ann-Kathrin; Weber, Andrea
2016-01-01
In two eye-tracking experiments, the effects of salience in accent training and speech accentedness on spoken-word recognition were investigated. Salience was expected to increase a stimulus' prominence and therefore promote learning. A training-test paradigm was used on native German participants utilizing an artificial German accent. Salience was elicited by two different criteria: production and listening training as a subjective criterion and accented (Experiment 1) and canonical test words (Experiment 2) as an objective criterion. During training in Experiment 1, participants either read single German words out loud and deliberately devoiced initial voiced stop consonants (e.g., Balken-"beam" pronounced as (*) Palken), or they listened to pre-recorded words with the same accent. In a subsequent eye-tracking experiment, looks to auditorily presented target words with the accent were analyzed. Participants from both training conditions fixated accented target words more often than a control group without training. Training was identical in Experiment 2, but during test, canonical German words that overlapped in onset with the accented words from training were presented as target words (e.g., Palme-"palm tree" overlapped in onset with the training word (*) Palken) rather than accented words. This time, no training effect was observed; recognition of canonical word forms was not affected by having learned the accent. Therefore, accent learning was only visible when the accented test tokens in Experiment 1, which were not included in the test of Experiment 2, possessed sufficient salience based on the objective criterion "accent." These effects were not modified by the subjective criterion of salience from the training modality.
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Iranian EFL Teachers’ Perceptions of Learning Accent
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Hassan Galbat
2018-05-01
Full Text Available Since the appearance of “Audio-lingual Method”, the issue of foreign accent has been the focus of many researchers and many teachers attempted to sound as native like as possible to better teach native English accent. The present study attempted to uncover the Iranian EFL teachers’ perceptions on accent, the way they viewed their own accent, and how English accent can be improved. Totally 50 male and female teachers with different age range, qualifications, teaching and learning experiences participated in the study. The data of the study were collected using Teachers’ Perceptions of Accent Questionnaire developed by the researcher and semi-structured interviews. Based on the analysis performed on the data collected through questionnaires and interviews, it was found that teachers care about learning accent and they considered it valuable and important. They admitted that they have foreign accent to some degree and they did not seem to be happy with foreign accent and were more in favour of native like accent. Regarding the strategies to improve English accent, they mentioned techniques like listening to authentic language, understanding pronunciation rules, and comparing people’s accent with their own accent, watching English movies, noticing stress, and pronunciation patterns, imitating, speaking with native people, using books, and recording and monitoring their own speeches.
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Psychogenic Foreign Accent Syndrome: a new case
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Stefanie eKeulen
2016-04-01
Full Text Available This paper presents the case of a 33-year-old, right-handed, French-speaking Belgian lady who was involved in a car accident as a pedestrian. Six months after the incident she developed a German/Flemish-like accent. The patient’s medical history, the onset of the FAS and the possible psychological causes of the accent change are analyzed. Relevant neuropsychological, neurolinguistic and psychodiagnostic test results are presented and discussed. The psychodiagnostic interview and testing will receive special attention, because these have been underreported in previous FAS case reports. Furthermore, an accent rating experiment was carried out in order to assess the foreign quality of the patient’s speech. Pre- and post-morbid spontaneous speech samples were analyzed phonetically to identify the pronunciation characteristics associated with this type of FAS. Several findings were considered essential in the diagnosis of psychogenic FAS: the psychological assessments as well as the clinical interview confirmed the presence of psychological problems, while neurological damage was excluded by means of repeated neuroimaging and neurological examinations. The type and nature of the speech symptoms and the accent fluctuations associated with the patient's psychological state cannot be explained by a neurological disorder. Moreover, the indifference of the patient towards her condition may also suggest a psychogenic etiology, as the opposite is usually observed in neurogenic FAS patients.
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Automatically identifying characteristic features of non-native English accents
Bloem, Jelke; Wieling, Martijn; Nerbonne, John; Côté, Marie-Hélène; Knooihuizen, Remco; Nerbonne, John
2016-01-01
In this work, we demonstrate the application of statistical measures from dialectometry to the study of accented English speech. This new methodology enables a more quantitative approach to the study of accents. Studies on spoken dialect data have shown that a combination of representativeness (the
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Automatic initial and final segmentation in cleft palate speech of Mandarin speakers.
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Ling He
Full Text Available The speech unit segmentation is an important pre-processing step in the analysis of cleft palate speech. In Mandarin, one syllable is composed of two parts: initial and final. In cleft palate speech, the resonance disorders occur at the finals and the voiced initials, while the articulation disorders occur at the unvoiced initials. Thus, the initials and finals are the minimum speech units, which could reflect the characteristics of cleft palate speech disorders. In this work, an automatic initial/final segmentation method is proposed. It is an important preprocessing step in cleft palate speech signal processing. The tested cleft palate speech utterances are collected from the Cleft Palate Speech Treatment Center in the Hospital of Stomatology, Sichuan University, which has the largest cleft palate patients in China. The cleft palate speech data includes 824 speech segments, and the control samples contain 228 speech segments. The syllables are extracted from the speech utterances firstly. The proposed syllable extraction method avoids the training stage, and achieves a good performance for both voiced and unvoiced speech. Then, the syllables are classified into with "quasi-unvoiced" or with "quasi-voiced" initials. Respective initial/final segmentation methods are proposed to these two types of syllables. Moreover, a two-step segmentation method is proposed. The rough locations of syllable and initial/final boundaries are refined in the second segmentation step, in order to improve the robustness of segmentation accuracy. The experiments show that the initial/final segmentation accuracies for syllables with quasi-unvoiced initials are higher than quasi-voiced initials. For the cleft palate speech, the mean time error is 4.4ms for syllables with quasi-unvoiced initials, and 25.7ms for syllables with quasi-voiced initials, and the correct segmentation accuracy P30 for all the syllables is 91.69%. For the control samples, P30 for all the
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Nunung Supriadi
2015-01-01
Full Text Available This study focuses on Chinese pronunciation errors by students of Chinese D3 Program at Jenderal Soedirman University. The data collected using interview and observation methods were analyzed with the theory of transformational-generative phonology and a speech analyser program. The result shows that pronunciation errors occur because the consonants supposed to be pronounced with aspiration were pronounced without aspiration, and consonants supposed to be pronounced at the post-alveolar articulation were pronounced at the frontal alveolar. The factor causing the pronunciation error is the phonological system difference between Chinese and Indonesia, and Chinese and Javanese as the mother tongue of the respondents. Penelitian ini membahas kesalahan pengucapan bahasa Mandarin oleh mahasiswa Program D3 bahasa Mandarin Universitas Jenderal Soedirman. Data diperoleh menggunakan metode wawancara dan observasi, kemudian data dianalisis dengan teori fonologi generatif transformasional dan program ‘speech analyzer’. Hasil analisis menunjukkan bahwa kesalahan pengucapan bahasa Mandarin terjadi karena bunyi konsonan yang seharusnya diucapkan aspirasi, tetapi diucapkan tanpa aspirasi, dan bunyi konsonan dengan letak artikulasi ‘post alveolar’ diucapkan dengan ‘frontal anterior’. Faktor penyebab terjadinya kesalahan adalah karena perbedaan sistem fonologis bahasa Mandarin dan bahasa Indonesia ataupun bahasa Jawa, yang merupakan bahasa ibu para responden
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Malaysian University Students' Attitudes towards Six Varieties of Accented Speech in English
Ahmed, Zainab Thamer; Abdullah, Ain Nadzimah; Heng, Chan Swee
2014-01-01
Previous language attitude studies indicated that in many countries all over the world, English language learners perceived native accents, either American or British, more positively than the non-native accents such as the Japanese, Korean, and Austrian accents. However, in Malaysia it is still unclear which accent Malaysian learners of English…
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Results using the OPAL strategy in Mandarin speaking cochlear implant recipients.
Vandali, Andrew E; Dawson, Pam W; Arora, Komal
2017-01-01
To evaluate the effectiveness of an experimental pitch-coding strategy for improving recognition of Mandarin lexical tone in cochlear implant (CI) recipients. Adult CI recipients were tested on recognition of Mandarin tones in quiet and speech-shaped noise at a signal-to-noise ratio of +10 dB; Mandarin sentence speech-reception threshold (SRT) in speech-shaped noise; and pitch discrimination of synthetic complex-harmonic tones in quiet. Two versions of the experimental strategy were examined: (OPAL) linear (1:1) mapping of fundamental frequency (F0) to the coded modulation rate; and (OPAL+) transposed mapping of high F0s to a lower coded rate. Outcomes were compared to results using the clinical ACE™ strategy. Five Mandarin speaking users of Nucleus® cochlear implants. A small but significant benefit in recognition of lexical tones was observed using OPAL compared to ACE in noise, but not in quiet, and not for OPAL+ compared to ACE or OPAL in quiet or noise. Sentence SRTs were significantly better using OPAL+ and comparable using OPAL to those using ACE. No differences in pitch discrimination thresholds were observed across strategies. OPAL can provide benefits to Mandarin lexical tone recognition in moderately noisy conditions and preserve perception of Mandarin sentences in challenging noise conditions.
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Wu, Che-Ming; Liu, Tien-Chen; Wang, Nan-Mai; Chao, Wei-Chieh
2013-08-01
(1) To understand speech perception and communication ability through real telephone calls by Mandarin-speaking children with cochlear implants and compare them to live-voice perception, (2) to report the general condition of telephone use of this population, and (3) to investigate the factors that correlate with telephone speech perception performance. Fifty-six children with over 4 years of implant use (aged 6.8-13.6 years, mean duration 8.0 years) took three speech perception tests administered using telephone and live voice to examine sentence, monosyllabic-word and Mandarin tone perception. The children also filled out a questionnaire survey investigating everyday telephone use. Wilcoxon signed-rank test was used to compare the scores between live-voice and telephone tests, and Pearson's test to examine the correlation between them. The mean scores were 86.4%, 69.8% and 70.5% respectively for sentence, word and tone recognition over the telephone. The corresponding live-voice mean scores were 94.3%, 84.0% and 70.8%. Wilcoxon signed-rank test showed the sentence and word scores were significantly different between telephone and live voice test, while the tone recognition scores were not, indicating tone perception was less worsened by telephone transmission than words and sentences. Spearman's test showed that chronological age and duration of implant use were weakly correlated with the perception test scores. The questionnaire survey showed 78% of the children could initiate phone calls and 59% could use the telephone 2 years after implantation. Implanted children are potentially capable of using the telephone 2 years after implantation, and communication ability over the telephone becomes satisfactory 4 years after implantation. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.
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Effects of age and hearing loss on recognition of unaccented and accented multisyllabic words
Gordon-Salant, Sandra; Yeni-Komshian, Grace H.; Fitzgibbons, Peter J.; Cohen, Julie I.
2015-01-01
The effects of age and hearing loss on recognition of unaccented and accented words of varying syllable length were investigated. It was hypothesized that with increments in length of syllables, there would be atypical alterations in syllable stress in accented compared to native English, and that these altered stress patterns would be sensitive to auditory temporal processing deficits with aging. Sets of one-, two-, three-, and four-syllable words with the same initial syllable were recorded by one native English and two Spanish-accented talkers. Lists of these words were presented in isolation and in sentence contexts to younger and older normal-hearing listeners and to older hearing-impaired listeners. Hearing loss effects were apparent for unaccented and accented monosyllabic words, whereas age effects were observed for recognition of accented multisyllabic words, consistent with the notion that altered syllable stress patterns with accent are sensitive for revealing effects of age. Older listeners also exhibited lower recognition scores for moderately accented words in sentence contexts than in isolation, suggesting that the added demands on working memory for words in sentence contexts impact recognition of accented speech. The general pattern of results suggests that hearing loss, age, and cognitive factors limit the ability to recognize Spanish-accented speech. PMID:25698021
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Lopes, Leonardo Wanderley; Lima, Ivonaldo Leidson Barbosa; Silva, Eveline Gonçalves; Almeida, Larissa Nadjara Alves de; Almeida, Anna Alice Figueiredo de
2013-01-01
To analyze the preferences and attitudes of listeners in relation to regional (RA) and softened accents (SA) in television journalism. Three television news presenters recorded carrier phrases and a standard text using RA and SA. The recordings were presented to 105 judges who listened to the word pairs and answered whether they perceived differences between the RA and SA, and the type of pronunciation that they preferred in the speech of television news presenters. Afterwards, they listened to the sentences and judged seven attributes in the contexts of RA and SA using a semantic differential scale. The listeners perceived the difference between the regional and softened pronunciation (pstudied (pstudied (pstudied.
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Listening to accented speech in a second language: First language and age of acquisition effects.
Larraza, Saioa; Samuel, Arthur G; Oñederra, Miren Lourdes
2016-11-01
Bilingual speakers must acquire the phonemic inventory of 2 languages and need to recognize spoken words cross-linguistically; a demanding job potentially made even more difficult due to dialectal variation, an intrinsic property of speech. The present work examines how bilinguals perceive second language (L2) accented speech and where accommodation to dialectal variation takes place. Dialectal effects were analyzed at different levels: An AXB discrimination task tapped phonetic-phonological representations, an auditory lexical-decision task tested for effects in accessing the lexicon, and an auditory priming task looked for semantic processing effects. Within that central focus, the goal was to see whether perceptual adjustment at a given level is affected by 2 main linguistic factors: bilinguals' first language and age of acquisition of the L2. Taking advantage of the cross-linguistic situation of the Basque language, bilinguals with different first languages (Spanish or French) and ages of acquisition of Basque (simultaneous, early, or late) were tested. Our use of multiple tasks with multiple types of bilinguals demonstrates that in spite of very similar discrimination capacity, French-Basque versus Spanish-Basque simultaneous bilinguals' performance on lexical access significantly differed. Similarly, results of the early and late groups show that the mapping of phonetic-phonological information onto lexical representations is a more demanding process that accentuates non-native processing difficulties. L1 and AoA effects were more readily overcome in semantic processing; accented variants regularly created priming effects in the different groups of bilinguals. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved).
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Li, Aike; Post, Brechtje
2014-01-01
This study examines the development of speech rhythm in second language (L2) learners of typologically different first languages (L1s) at different levels of proficiency. An empirical investigation of durational variation in L2 English productions by L1 Mandarin learners and L1 German learners compared to native control values in English and the…
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A Neural Marker for Social Bias Toward In-group Accents.
Bestelmeyer, Patricia E G; Belin, Pascal; Ladd, D Robert
2015-10-01
Accents provide information about the speaker's geographical, socio-economic, and ethnic background. Research in applied psychology and sociolinguistics suggests that we generally prefer our own accent to other varieties of our native language and attribute more positive traits to it. Despite the widespread influence of accents on social interactions, educational and work settings the neural underpinnings of this social bias toward our own accent and, what may drive this bias, are unexplored. We measured brain activity while participants from two different geographical backgrounds listened passively to 3 English accent types embedded in an adaptation design. Cerebral activity in several regions, including bilateral amygdalae, revealed a significant interaction between the participants' own accent and the accent they listened to: while repetition of own accents elicited an enhanced neural response, repetition of the other group's accent resulted in reduced responses classically associated with adaptation. Our findings suggest that increased social relevance of, or greater emotional sensitivity to in-group accents, may underlie the own-accent bias. Our results provide a neural marker for the bias associated with accents, and show, for the first time, that the neural response to speech is partly shaped by the geographical background of the listener. © The Author 2014. Published by Oxford University Press.
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Phonological processing in Mandarin speakers with congenital amusia.
Wang, Xiao; Peng, Gang
2014-12-01
Although there is an emerging consensus that both musical and linguistic pitch processing can be problematic for individuals with a developmental disorder termed congenital amusia, the nature of such a pitch-processing deficit, especially that demonstrated in a speech setting, remains unclear. Therefore, this study tested the performance of native Mandarin speakers, both with and without amusia, on discrimination and imitation tasks for Cantonese level tones, aiming to shed light on this issue. Results suggest that the impact of the phonological deficit, coupled with that of the domain-general pitch deficit, could provide a more comprehensive interpretation of Mandarin amusics' speech impairment. Specifically, when there was a high demand for pitch sensitivity, as in fine-grained pitch discriminations, the operation of the pitch-processing deficit played the more predominant role in modulating amusics' speech performance. But when the demand was low, as in discriminating naturally produced Cantonese level tones, the impact of the phonological deficit was more pronounced compared to that of the pitch-processing deficit. However, despite their perceptual deficits, Mandarin amusics' imitation abilities were comparable to controls'. Such selective impairment in tonal perception suggests that the phonological deficit more severely implicates amusics' input pathways.
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Agnosia for accents in primary progressive aphasia☆
Fletcher, Phillip D.; Downey, Laura E.; Agustus, Jennifer L.; Hailstone, Julia C.; Tyndall, Marina H.; Cifelli, Alberto; Schott, Jonathan M.; Warrington, Elizabeth K.; Warren, Jason D.
2013-01-01
As an example of complex auditory signal processing, the analysis of accented speech is potentially vulnerable in the progressive aphasias. However, the brain basis of accent processing and the effects of neurodegenerative disease on this processing are not well understood. Here we undertook a detailed neuropsychological study of a patient, AA with progressive nonfluent aphasia, in whom agnosia for accents was a prominent clinical feature. We designed a battery to assess AA's ability to process accents in relation to other complex auditory signals. AA's performance was compared with a cohort of 12 healthy age and gender matched control participants and with a second patient, PA, who had semantic dementia with phonagnosia and prosopagnosia but no reported difficulties with accent processing. Relative to healthy controls, the patients showed distinct profiles of accent agnosia. AA showed markedly impaired ability to distinguish change in an individual's accent despite being able to discriminate phonemes and voices (apperceptive accent agnosia); and in addition, a severe deficit of accent identification. In contrast, PA was able to perceive changes in accents, phonemes and voices normally, but showed a relatively mild deficit of accent identification (associative accent agnosia). Both patients showed deficits of voice and environmental sound identification, however PA showed an additional deficit of face identification whereas AA was able to identify (though not name) faces normally. These profiles suggest that AA has conjoint (or interacting) deficits involving both apperceptive and semantic processing of accents, while PA has a primary semantic (associative) deficit affecting accents along with other kinds of auditory objects and extending beyond the auditory modality. Brain MRI revealed left peri-Sylvian atrophy in case AA and relatively focal asymmetric (predominantly right sided) temporal lobe atrophy in case PA. These cases provide further evidence for the
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Agnosia for accents in primary progressive aphasia.
Fletcher, Phillip D; Downey, Laura E; Agustus, Jennifer L; Hailstone, Julia C; Tyndall, Marina H; Cifelli, Alberto; Schott, Jonathan M; Warrington, Elizabeth K; Warren, Jason D
2013-08-01
As an example of complex auditory signal processing, the analysis of accented speech is potentially vulnerable in the progressive aphasias. However, the brain basis of accent processing and the effects of neurodegenerative disease on this processing are not well understood. Here we undertook a detailed neuropsychological study of a patient, AA with progressive nonfluent aphasia, in whom agnosia for accents was a prominent clinical feature. We designed a battery to assess AA's ability to process accents in relation to other complex auditory signals. AA's performance was compared with a cohort of 12 healthy age and gender matched control participants and with a second patient, PA, who had semantic dementia with phonagnosia and prosopagnosia but no reported difficulties with accent processing. Relative to healthy controls, the patients showed distinct profiles of accent agnosia. AA showed markedly impaired ability to distinguish change in an individual's accent despite being able to discriminate phonemes and voices (apperceptive accent agnosia); and in addition, a severe deficit of accent identification. In contrast, PA was able to perceive changes in accents, phonemes and voices normally, but showed a relatively mild deficit of accent identification (associative accent agnosia). Both patients showed deficits of voice and environmental sound identification, however PA showed an additional deficit of face identification whereas AA was able to identify (though not name) faces normally. These profiles suggest that AA has conjoint (or interacting) deficits involving both apperceptive and semantic processing of accents, while PA has a primary semantic (associative) deficit affecting accents along with other kinds of auditory objects and extending beyond the auditory modality. Brain MRI revealed left peri-Sylvian atrophy in case AA and relatively focal asymmetric (predominantly right sided) temporal lobe atrophy in case PA. These cases provide further evidence for the
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Huei-Mei Liu
Full Text Available The purpose of this study was to use mismatch responses (MMRs to explore the dynamic changes of Mandarin speech perception abilities from early to middle childhood. Twenty preschoolers, 18 school-aged children, and 26 adults participated in this study. Two sets of synthesized speech stimuli varying in Mandarin consonant (alveolo-palatal affricate vs. fricative and lexical tone features (rising vs. contour tone were used to examine the developmental course of speech perception abilities. The results indicated that only the adult group demonstrated typical early mismatch negativity (MMN responses, suggesting that the ability to discriminate specific speech cues in Mandarin consonant and lexical tone is a continuing process in preschool- and school-aged children. Additionally, distinct MMR patterns provided evidence indicating diverse developmental courses to different speech characteristics. By incorporating data from the two speech conditions, we propose using MMR profiles consisting of mismatch negativity (MMN, positive mismatch response (p-MMR, and late discriminative negativity (LDN as possible brain indices to investigate speech perception development.
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Exploring the Mechanism of Tonal Contraction in Taiwan Mandarin
Cheng, C.; Xu, Y.; Gubian, M.
2010-01-01
This study investigates the mechanism of tonal contraction when a disyllabic unit is merged into a monosyllable at fast speech rate in Taiwan Mandarin. Various degrees of contraction of bi-tonal sequences were elicited by manipulating speech rates. Functional Data Analysis was performed to compare
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Effects of regiolects on the perception of developmental foreign accent syndrome
Tops, Wim; Neimeijer, Silke; Mariën, Peter
Foreign accent syndrome (FAS) is a relatively rare speech motor disorder in which the pro- nunciation of an affected speaker is perceived as distinctly foreign by listeners of the same language community. Because of various close semiological resemblances with apraxia of speech, FAS has been
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Cai, Zhenguang G; Gilbert, Rebecca A; Davis, Matthew H; Gaskell, M Gareth; Farrar, Lauren; Adler, Sarah; Rodd, Jennifer M
2017-11-01
Speech carries accent information relevant to determining the speaker's linguistic and social background. A series of web-based experiments demonstrate that accent cues can modulate access to word meaning. In Experiments 1-3, British participants were more likely to retrieve the American dominant meaning (e.g., hat meaning of "bonnet") in a word association task if they heard the words in an American than a British accent. In addition, results from a speeded semantic decision task (Experiment 4) and sentence comprehension task (Experiment 5) confirm that accent modulates on-line meaning retrieval such that comprehension of ambiguous words is easier when the relevant word meaning is dominant in the speaker's dialect. Critically, neutral-accent speech items, created by morphing British- and American-accented recordings, were interpreted in a similar way to accented words when embedded in a context of accented words (Experiment 2). This finding indicates that listeners do not use accent to guide meaning retrieval on a word-by-word basis; instead they use accent information to determine the dialectic identity of a speaker and then use their experience of that dialect to guide meaning access for all words spoken by that person. These results motivate a speaker-model account of spoken word recognition in which comprehenders determine key characteristics of their interlocutor and use this knowledge to guide word meaning access. Copyright © 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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Accent Imitation Positively Affects Language Attitudes
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Patti eAdank
2013-05-01
Full Text Available People in conversation tend to accommodate the way they speak. It has been assumed that this tendency to imitate each other’s speech patterns serves to increase liking between partners in a conversation. Previous experiments examined the effect of perceived social attractiveness on the tendency to imitate someone else’s speech and found that vocal imitation increased when perceived attractiveness was higher. The present experiment extends this research by examining the inverse relationship and examines how overt vocal imitation affects attitudes. Participants listened to sentences spoken by two speakers of a regional accent (Glaswegian of English. They vocally repeated (speaking in their own accent without imitating the sentences spoken by a Glaswegian speaker, and subsequently imitated sentences spoken by a second Glaswegian speaker (order counterbalanced across participants. After each repeating or imitation session, participants completed a questionnaire probing the speakers’ perceived power, competence, and social attractiveness. Imitating had a positive effect on the perceived social attractiveness of the speaker compared to repeating. These results are interpreted in light of Communication Accommodation Theory.
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Accent imitation positively affects language attitudes.
Adank, Patti; Stewart, Andrew J; Connell, Louise; Wood, Jeffrey
2013-01-01
People in conversation tend to accommodate the way they speak. It has been assumed that this tendency to imitate each other's speech patterns serves to increase liking between partners in a conversation. Previous experiments examined the effect of perceived social attractiveness on the tendency to imitate someone else's speech and found that vocal imitation increased when perceived attractiveness was higher. The present experiment extends this research by examining the inverse relationship and examines how overt vocal imitation affects attitudes. Participants listened to sentences spoken by two speakers of a regional accent (Glaswegian) of English. They vocally repeated (speaking in their own accent without imitating) the sentences spoken by a Glaswegian speaker, and subsequently imitated sentences spoken by a second Glaswegian speaker (order counterbalanced across participants). After each repeating or imitation session, participants completed a questionnaire probing the speakers' perceived power, competence, and social attractiveness. Imitating had a positive effect on the perceived social attractiveness of the speaker compared to repeating. These results are interpreted in light of Communication Accommodation Theory.
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The development and validation of the Closed-set Mandarin Sentence (CMS) test.
Tao, Duo-Duo; Fu, Qian-Jie; Galvin, John J; Yu, Ya-Feng
2017-09-01
Matrix-styled sentence tests offer a closed-set paradigm that may be useful when evaluating speech intelligibility. Ideally, sentence test materials should reflect the distribution of phonemes within the target language. We developed and validated the Closed-set Mandarin Sentence (CMS) test to assess Mandarin speech intelligibility in noise. CMS test materials were selected to be familiar words and to represent the natural distribution of vowels, consonants, and lexical tones found in Mandarin Chinese. Ten key words in each of five categories (Name, Verb, Number, Color, and Fruit) were produced by a native Mandarin talker, resulting in a total of 50 words that could be combined to produce 100,000 unique sentences. Normative data were collected in 10 normal-hearing, adult Mandarin-speaking Chinese listeners using a closed-set test paradigm. Two test runs were conducted for each subject, and 20 sentences per run were randomly generated while ensuring that each word was presented only twice in each run. First, the level of the words in each category were adjusted to produce equal intelligibility in noise. Test-retest reliability for word-in-sentence recognition was excellent according to Cronbach's alpha (0.952). After the category level adjustments, speech reception thresholds (SRTs) for sentences in noise, defined as the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) that produced 50% correct whole sentence recognition, were adaptively measured by adjusting the SNR according to the correctness of response. The mean SRT was -7.9 (SE=0.41) and -8.1 (SE=0.34) dB for runs 1 and 2, respectively. The mean standard deviation across runs was 0.93 dB, and paired t-tests showed no significant difference between runs 1 and 2 (p=0.74) despite random sentences being generated for each run and each subject. The results suggest that the CMS provides large stimulus set with which to repeatedly and reliably measure Mandarin-speaking listeners' speech understanding in noise using a closed-set paradigm.
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The Conflation of /l/ and /r/: New Zealand Perceptions of Japanese-Accented English
Watanabe, Yutai
2017-01-01
As a case study of non-linguists' perceptions of accent, this paper investigates how accurately and on what basis Japanese-accented English (JAE) is discernible from other L2 varieties of English in New Zealand (NZ). The paper sheds light on how a feature salient in speech is associated with the perceived sociolinguistic identity of speakers. An…
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Chen, Xizhuo; Zhao, Yanxin; Zhong, Suyu; Cui, Zaixu; Li, Jiaqi; Gong, Gaolang; Dong, Qi; Nan, Yun
2018-05-01
The arcuate fasciculus (AF) is a neural fiber tract that is critical to speech and music development. Although the predominant role of the left AF in speech development is relatively clear, how the AF engages in music development is not understood. Congenital amusia is a special neurodevelopmental condition, which not only affects musical pitch but also speech tone processing. Using diffusion tensor tractography, we aimed at understanding the role of AF in music and speech processing by examining the neural connectivity characteristics of the bilateral AF among thirty Mandarin amusics. Compared to age- and intelligence quotient (IQ)-matched controls, amusics demonstrated increased connectivity as reflected by the increased fractional anisotropy in the right posterior AF but decreased connectivity as reflected by the decreased volume in the right anterior AF. Moreover, greater fractional anisotropy in the left direct AF was correlated with worse performance in speech tone perception among amusics. This study is the first to examine the neural connectivity of AF in the neurodevelopmental condition of amusia as a result of disrupted music pitch and speech tone processing. We found abnormal white matter structural connectivity in the right AF for the amusic individuals. Moreover, we demonstrated that the white matter microstructural properties of the left direct AF is modulated by lexical tone deficits among the amusic individuals. These data support the notion of distinctive pitch processing systems between music and speech.
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Keulen, Stefanie; Mariën, Peter; van Dun, Kim; Bastiaanse, Roelien; Manto, Mario; Verhoeven, Jo
Foreign accent syndrome is a rare motor speech disorder that causes patients to speak their language with a non-native accent. In the neurogenic condition, the disorder develops after lesions in the language dominant hemisphere, often affecting Broca's area, the insula, the supplementary motor area
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Li, Xiaoqing; Lu, Yong; Zhao, Haiyan
2014-11-01
The present study used EEG to investigate how and when top-down prediction interacts with bottom-up acoustic signals in temporally selective attention during speech comprehension. Mandarin Chinese spoken sentences were used as stimuli. We systematically manipulated the predictability and de/accentuation of the critical words in the sentence context. Meanwhile, a linguistic attention probe 'ba' was presented concurrently with the critical words or not. The results showed that, first, words with a linguistic attention probe elicited a larger N1 than those without a probe. The latency of this N1 effect was shortened for accented or lowly predictable words, indicating more attentional resources allocated to these words. Importantly, prediction and accentuation showed a complementary interplay on the latency of this N1 effect, demonstrating that when the words had already attracted attention due to low predictability or due to the presence of pitch accent, the other factor did not modulate attention allocation anymore. Second, relative to the lowly predictable words, the highly predictable words elicited a reduced N400 and enhanced gamma-band power increases, especially under the accented conditions; moreover, under the accented conditions, shorter N1 peak-latency was found to correlate with larger gamma-band power enhancement, which indicates that a close relationship might exist between early selective attention and later semantic integration. Finally, the interaction between top-down selective attention (driven by prediction) and bottom-up selective attention (driven by accentuation) occurred before lexical-semantic processing, namely before the N400 effect evoked by predictability, which was discussed with regard to the language comprehension models. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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Bent, Tessa; Holt, Rachael Frush
2018-02-01
Children's ability to understand speakers with a wide range of dialects and accents is essential for efficient language development and communication in a global society. Here, the impact of regional dialect and foreign-accent variability on children's speech understanding was evaluated in both quiet and noisy conditions. Five- to seven-year-old children ( n = 90) and adults ( n = 96) repeated sentences produced by three speakers with different accents-American English, British English, and Japanese-accented English-in quiet or noisy conditions. Adults had no difficulty understanding any speaker in quiet conditions. Their performance declined for the nonnative speaker with a moderate amount of noise; their performance only substantially declined for the British English speaker (i.e., below 93% correct) when their understanding of the American English speaker was also impeded. In contrast, although children showed accurate word recognition for the American and British English speakers in quiet conditions, they had difficulty understanding the nonnative speaker even under ideal listening conditions. With a moderate amount of noise, their perception of British English speech declined substantially and their ability to understand the nonnative speaker was particularly poor. These results suggest that although school-aged children can understand unfamiliar native dialects under ideal listening conditions, their ability to recognize words in these dialects may be highly susceptible to the influence of environmental degradation. Fully adult-like word identification for speakers with unfamiliar accents and dialects may exhibit a protracted developmental trajectory.
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So, Connie K.
2005-04-01
The present study investigated to what extent ones' L1 prosodic backgrounds affect their learning of a new tonal system. The question as to whether native speakers of a tone language perform differently from those of a pitch accent language will be addressed. Twenty native speakers of Hong Kong Cantonese (a tone language) and Japanese (a pitch accent language) were assigned to two groups. All of them had had no prior knowledge of Mandarin, and had never received any form of musical training before they participated in the study. Their performance of the identification of Mandarin tones before and after a short-term training was compared. Analysis of listeners' tonal confusions in the pretest, posttest, and generalization tests revealed that both Cantonese and Japanese listeners had more confusion for two contrastive tone pairs: Tone 1-Tone 4, and Tone 2-Tone 3. Moreover, Cantonese speakers consistently had greater difficulty than Japanese speakers in distinguishing the tones in each pair. These imply that listeners L1 prosodic backgrounds are at work during the process of learning a new tonal system. The findings will be further discussed in terms of the Perceptual Assimilation Model (Best, 1995). [Work supported by SSHRC.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Juan Zhang
2018-05-01
Full Text Available The present study investigated the impact of Chinese dialects on McGurk effect using behavioral and event-related potential (ERP methodologies. Specifically, intra-language comparison of McGurk effect was conducted between Mandarin and Cantonese speakers. The behavioral results showed that Cantonese speakers exhibited a stronger McGurk effect in audiovisual speech perception compared to Mandarin speakers, although both groups performed equally in the auditory and visual conditions. ERP results revealed that Cantonese speakers were more sensitive to visual cues than Mandarin speakers, though this was not the case for the auditory cues. Taken together, the current findings suggest that the McGurk effect generated by Chinese speakers is mainly influenced by segmental phonology during audiovisual speech integration.
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Zhang, Juan; Meng, Yaxuan; McBride, Catherine; Fan, Xitao; Yuan, Zhen
2018-01-01
The present study investigated the impact of Chinese dialects on McGurk effect using behavioral and event-related potential (ERP) methodologies. Specifically, intra-language comparison of McGurk effect was conducted between Mandarin and Cantonese speakers. The behavioral results showed that Cantonese speakers exhibited a stronger McGurk effect in audiovisual speech perception compared to Mandarin speakers, although both groups performed equally in the auditory and visual conditions. ERP results revealed that Cantonese speakers were more sensitive to visual cues than Mandarin speakers, though this was not the case for the auditory cues. Taken together, the current findings suggest that the McGurk effect generated by Chinese speakers is mainly influenced by segmental phonology during audiovisual speech integration. PMID:29780312
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Lexical tone and stuttering loci in Mandarin: evidence from preschool children who stutter.
Chou, Fang-Chi; Zebrowski, Patricia; Yang, Shu-Lan
2015-02-01
The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between stuttering loci and lexical tone in Mandarin-speaking preschoolers. Conversational samples from 20 Taiwanese children who stutter (CWS; M = 4:9; range = 3:2-6:4) were analysed for frequency and type of speech disfluency and lexical tone associated with stuttering-like disfluencies (SLDs). Results indicated that SLDs were significantly more likely to be produced on Mandarin syllables carrying Tone 3 and Tone 4 syllables compared to syllables carrying either Tone 1 or Tone 2. Post-hoc analyses revealed: (1) no significant differences in the stuttering frequencies between Tone 1 and Tone 2, or between Tone 3 and Tone 4, and (2) a higher incidence of stuttering on syllables carrying Tone 3 and Tone 4 embedded in conflicting (as opposed to compatible) tonal contexts. Results suggest that the higher incidence of stuttering on Mandarin syllables carrying either Tone 3 or 4 may be attributed to the increased level of speech motor demand underlying rapid F0 change both within and across syllables.
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A music perception disorder (congenital amusia) influences speech comprehension.
Liu, Fang; Jiang, Cunmei; Wang, Bei; Xu, Yi; Patel, Aniruddh D
2015-01-01
This study investigated the underlying link between speech and music by examining whether and to what extent congenital amusia, a musical disorder characterized by degraded pitch processing, would impact spoken sentence comprehension for speakers of Mandarin, a tone language. Sixteen Mandarin-speaking amusics and 16 matched controls were tested on the intelligibility of news-like Mandarin sentences with natural and flat fundamental frequency (F0) contours (created via speech resynthesis) under four signal-to-noise (SNR) conditions (no noise, +5, 0, and -5dB SNR). While speech intelligibility in quiet and extremely noisy conditions (SNR=-5dB) was not significantly compromised by flattened F0, both amusic and control groups achieved better performance with natural-F0 sentences than flat-F0 sentences under moderately noisy conditions (SNR=+5 and 0dB). Relative to normal listeners, amusics demonstrated reduced speech intelligibility in both quiet and noise, regardless of whether the F0 contours of the sentences were natural or flattened. This deficit in speech intelligibility was not associated with impaired pitch perception in amusia. These findings provide evidence for impaired speech comprehension in congenital amusia, suggesting that the deficit of amusics extends beyond pitch processing and includes segmental processing. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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When speaker identity is unavoidable: Neural processing of speaker identity cues in natural speech.
Tuninetti, Alba; Chládková, Kateřina; Peter, Varghese; Schiller, Niels O; Escudero, Paola
2017-11-01
Speech sound acoustic properties vary largely across speakers and accents. When perceiving speech, adult listeners normally disregard non-linguistic variation caused by speaker or accent differences, in order to comprehend the linguistic message, e.g. to correctly identify a speech sound or a word. Here we tested whether the process of normalizing speaker and accent differences, facilitating the recognition of linguistic information, is found at the level of neural processing, and whether it is modulated by the listeners' native language. In a multi-deviant oddball paradigm, native and nonnative speakers of Dutch were exposed to naturally-produced Dutch vowels varying in speaker, sex, accent, and phoneme identity. Unexpectedly, the analysis of mismatch negativity (MMN) amplitudes elicited by each type of change shows a large degree of early perceptual sensitivity to non-linguistic cues. This finding on perception of naturally-produced stimuli contrasts with previous studies examining the perception of synthetic stimuli wherein adult listeners automatically disregard acoustic cues to speaker identity. The present finding bears relevance to speech normalization theories, suggesting that at an unattended level of processing, listeners are indeed sensitive to changes in fundamental frequency in natural speech tokens. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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Acoustic and Perceptual Analyses of Adductor Spasmodic Dysphonia in Mandarin-speaking Chinese.
Chen, Zhipeng; Li, Jingyuan; Ren, Qingyi; Ge, Pingjiang
2018-02-12
The objective of this study was to examine the perceptual structure and acoustic characteristics of speech of patients with adductor spasmodic dysphonia (ADSD) in Mandarin. Case-Control Study MATERIALS AND METHODS: For the estimation of dysphonia level, perceptual and acoustic analysis were used for patients with ADSD (N = 20) and the control group (N = 20) that are Mandarin-Chinese speakers. For both subgroups, a sustained vowel and connected speech samples were obtained. The difference of perceptual and acoustic parameters between the two subgroups was assessed and analyzed. For acoustic assessment, the percentage of phonatory breaks (PBs) of connected reading and the percentage of aperiodic segments and frequency shifts (FS) of vowel and reading in patients with ADSD were significantly worse than controls, the mean harmonics-to-noise ratio and the fundamental frequency standard deviation of vowel as well. For perceptual evaluation, the rating of speech and vowel in patients with ADSD are significantly higher than controls. The percentage of aberrant acoustic events (PB, frequency shift, and aperiodic segment) and the fundamental frequency standard deviation and mean harmonics-to-noise ratio were significantly correlated with the perceptual rating in the vowel and reading productions. The perceptual and acoustic parameters of connected vowel and reading in patients with ADSD are worse than those in normal controls, and could validly and reliably estimate dysphonia of ADSD in Mandarin-speaking Chinese. Copyright © 2017 The Voice Foundation. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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The effect of tonal changes on voice onset time in Mandarin esophageal speech.
Liu, Hanjun; Ng, Manwa L; Wan, Mingxi; Wang, Supin; Zhang, Yi
2008-03-01
The present study investigated the effect of tonal changes on voice onset time (VOT) between normal laryngeal (NL) and superior esophageal (SE) speakers of Mandarin Chinese. VOT values were measured from the syllables /pha/, /tha/, and /kha/ produced at four tone levels by eight NL and seven SE speakers who were native speakers of Mandarin. Results indicated that Mandarin tones were associated with significantly different VOT values for NL speakers, in which high-falling tone was associated with significantly shorter VOT values than mid-rising tone and falling-rising tone. Regarding speaker group, SE speakers showed significantly shorter VOT values than NL speakers across all tone levels. This may be related to their use of pharyngoesophageal (PE) segment as another sound source. SE speakers appear to take a shorter time to start PE segment vibration compared to NL speakers using the vocal folds for vibration.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Stefanie eKeulen
2016-03-01
Full Text Available A 40-year-old, non-aphasic, right-handed, and polyglot (L1: French, L2: Dutch, L3: English woman with a 12 year history of addiction to opiates and psychoactive substances, and clear psychiatric problems, presented with a foreign accent of sudden onset in L1. Speech evolved towards a mostly fluent output, despite a stutter-like behavior and a marked grammatical output disorder. The psychogenic etiology of the accent foreignness was construed based upon the patient’s complex medical history, and psychodiagnostic, neuropsychological, and neurolinguistic assessments. The presence of a foreign accent was affirmed by a perceptual accent rating and attribution experiment. It is argued that this patient provides additional evidence demonstrating the outdatedness of Whitaker’s (1982 definition of Foreign Accent Syndrome, as only one of the four operational criteria was unequivocally applicable to our patient: her accent foreignness was not only recognized by her relatives and the medical staff, but also by a group of native French-speaking laymen. However, our patient defied the three remaining criteria, as central nervous system damage could not conclusively be demonstrated, psychodiagnostic assessment raised the hypothesis of a conversion disorder, and the patient was a polyglot whose newly gained accent was associated with a range of foreign languages, which exceeded the ones she spoke.
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Van Engen, Kristin J.; Baese-Berk, Melissa; Baker, Rachel E.; Choi, Arim; Kim, Midam; Bradlow, Ann R.
2010-01-01
This paper describes the development of the Wildcat Corpus of native- and foreign-accented English, a corpus containing scripted and spontaneous speech recordings from 24 native speakers of American English and 52 non-native speakers of English. The core element of this corpus is a set of spontaneous speech recordings, for which a new method of…
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Beverly Hannah
2017-12-01
Full Text Available Speech perception involves multiple input modalities. Research has indicated that perceivers establish cross-modal associations between auditory and visuospatial events to aid perception. Such intermodal relations can be particularly beneficial for speech development and learning, where infants and non-native perceivers need additional resources to acquire and process new sounds. This study examines how facial articulatory cues and co-speech hand gestures mimicking pitch contours in space affect non-native Mandarin tone perception. Native English as well as Mandarin perceivers identified tones embedded in noise with either congruent or incongruent Auditory-Facial (AF and Auditory-FacialGestural (AFG inputs. Native Mandarin results showed the expected ceiling-level performance in the congruent AF and AFG conditions. In the incongruent conditions, while AF identification was primarily auditory-based, AFG identification was partially based on gestures, demonstrating the use of gestures as valid cues in tone identification. The English perceivers’ performance was poor in the congruent AF condition, but improved significantly in AFG. While the incongruent AF identification showed some reliance on facial information, incongruent AFG identification relied more on gestural than auditory-facial information. These results indicate positive effects of facial and especially gestural input on non-native tone perception, suggesting that cross-modal (visuospatial resources can be recruited to aid auditory perception when phonetic demands are high. The current findings may inform patterns of tone acquisition and development, suggesting how multi-modal speech enhancement principles may be applied to facilitate speech learning.
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The Effects of Lexical Pitch Accent on Infant Word Recognition in Japanese
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Mitsuhiko Ota
2018-01-01
Full Text Available Learners of lexical tone languages (e.g., Mandarin develop sensitivity to tonal contrasts and recognize pitch-matched, but not pitch-mismatched, familiar words by 11 months. Learners of non-tone languages (e.g., English also show a tendency to treat pitch patterns as lexically contrastive up to about 18 months. In this study, we examined if this early-developing capacity to lexically encode pitch variations enables infants to acquire a pitch accent system, in which pitch-based lexical contrasts are obscured by the interaction of lexical and non-lexical (i.e., intonational features. Eighteen 17-month-olds learning Tokyo Japanese were tested on their recognition of familiar words with the expected pitch or the lexically opposite pitch pattern. In early trials, infants were faster in shifting their eyegaze from the distractor object to the target object than in shifting from the target to distractor in the pitch-matched condition. In later trials, however, infants showed faster distractor-to-target than target-to-distractor shifts in both the pitch-matched and pitch-mismatched conditions. We interpret these results to mean that, in a pitch-accent system, the ability to use pitch variations to recognize words is still in a nascent state at 17 months.
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How do we perceive accents? The association between essentialist perceptions and accents
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
2015-09-01
Conclusions: Corresponding to previous research, our results indicate that accents can be used to categorise people and foster perceptions of group homogeneity. More importantly, we found this to be a dynamic process that included the perceivers’ perception of their own accent. We tentatively suggest that accents may serve as a mediating factor in the relationship between group categorisation and essentialist perceptions.
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Wu, Chung-Hsien; Su, Hung-Yu; Liu, Chao-Hong
2013-01-01
This study presents an efficient approach to personalized mispronunciation detection of Taiwanese-accented English. The main goal of this study was to detect frequently occurring mispronunciation patterns of Taiwanese-accented English instead of scoring English pronunciations directly. The proposed approach quickly identifies personalized…
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Nan, Yun; Huang, Wan-ting; Wang, Wen-jing; Liu, Chang; Dong, Qi
2016-01-01
The association/dissociation of pitch processing between music and language is a long lasting debate. We examined this music-language relationship by investigating to what extent pitch deficits in these two domains were dissociable. We focused on a special neurodevelopmental pitch disorder - congenital amusia, which primarily affects musical pitch processing. Recent research has also revealed lexical tone deficits in speech among amusics. Approximately one-third of Mandarin amusics exhibits behavioural difficulties in lexical tone perception, which is known as tone agnosia. Using mismatch negativities (MMNs), our current work probed lexical tone encoding at the pre-attentive level among the Mandarin amusics with (tone agnosics) and without (pure amusics) behavioural lexical tone deficits compared with age- and IQ-matched controls. Relative to the controls and the pure amusics, the tone agnosics exhibited reduced MMNs specifically in response to lexical tone changes. Their tone-consonant MMNs were intact and similar to those of the other two groups. Moreover, the tone MMN reduction over the left hemisphere was tightly linked to behavioural insensitivity to lexical tone changes. The current study thus provides the first psychophysiological evidence of subgroup differences in lexical tone processing among Mandarin amusics and links amusics' behavioural tone deficits to impaired pre-attentive tone processing. Despite the overall music pitch deficits, the subgroup differences in lexical tone processing in Mandarin-speaking amusics suggest dissociation of pitch deficits between music and speech. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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Speaker and Accent Variation Are Handled Differently: Evidence in Native and Non-Native Listeners
Kriengwatana, Buddhamas; Terry, Josephine; Chládková, Kateřina; Escudero, Paola
2016-01-01
Listeners are able to cope with between-speaker variability in speech that stems from anatomical sources (i.e. individual and sex differences in vocal tract size) and sociolinguistic sources (i.e. accents). We hypothesized that listeners adapt to these two types of variation differently because prior work indicates that adapting to speaker/sex variability may occur pre-lexically while adapting to accent variability may require learning from attention to explicit cues (i.e. feedback). In Experiment 1, we tested our hypothesis by training native Dutch listeners and Australian-English (AusE) listeners without any experience with Dutch or Flemish to discriminate between the Dutch vowels /I/ and /ε/ from a single speaker. We then tested their ability to classify /I/ and /ε/ vowels of a novel Dutch speaker (i.e. speaker or sex change only), or vowels of a novel Flemish speaker (i.e. speaker or sex change plus accent change). We found that both Dutch and AusE listeners could successfully categorize vowels if the change involved a speaker/sex change, but not if the change involved an accent change. When AusE listeners were given feedback on their categorization responses to the novel speaker in Experiment 2, they were able to successfully categorize vowels involving an accent change. These results suggest that adapting to accents may be a two-step process, whereby the first step involves adapting to speaker differences at a pre-lexical level, and the second step involves adapting to accent differences at a contextual level, where listeners have access to word meaning or are given feedback that allows them to appropriately adjust their perceptual category boundaries. PMID:27309889
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Acquisition of stress and pitch accent in English-Spanish bilingual children
Kim, Sahyang; Andruski, Jean; Nathan, Geoffrey S.; Casielles, Eugenia; Work, Richard
2005-09-01
Although understanding of prosodic development is considered crucial for understanding of language acquisition in general, few studies have focused on how children develop native-like prosody in their speech production. This study will examine the acquisition of lexical stress and postlexical pitch accent in two English-Spanish bilingual children. Prosodic characteristics of English and Spanish are different in terms of frequent stress patterns (trochaic versus penultimate), phonetic realization of stress (reduced unstressed vowel versus full unstressed vowel), and frequent pitch accent types (H* versus L*+H), among others. Thus, English-Spanish bilingual children's prosodic development may provide evidence of their awareness of language differences relatively early during language development, and illustrate the influence of markedness or input frequency in prosodic acquisition. For this study, recordings from the children's one-word stage are used. Durations of stressed and unstressed syllables and F0 peak alignment are measured, and pitch accent types in different accentual positions (nuclear versus prenuclear) are transcribed using American English ToBI and Spanish ToBI. Prosodic development is compared across ages within each language and across languages at each age. Furthermore, the bilingual children's productions are compared with monolingual English and Spanish parents' productions.
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Human phoneme recognition depending on speech-intrinsic variability.
Meyer, Bernd T; Jürgens, Tim; Wesker, Thorsten; Brand, Thomas; Kollmeier, Birger
2010-11-01
The influence of different sources of speech-intrinsic variation (speaking rate, effort, style and dialect or accent) on human speech perception was investigated. In listening experiments with 16 listeners, confusions of consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) and vowel-consonant-vowel (VCV) sounds in speech-weighted noise were analyzed. Experiments were based on the OLLO logatome speech database, which was designed for a man-machine comparison. It contains utterances spoken by 50 speakers from five dialect/accent regions and covers several intrinsic variations. By comparing results depending on intrinsic and extrinsic variations (i.e., different levels of masking noise), the degradation induced by variabilities can be expressed in terms of the SNR. The spectral level distance between the respective speech segment and the long-term spectrum of the masking noise was found to be a good predictor for recognition rates, while phoneme confusions were influenced by the distance to spectrally close phonemes. An analysis based on transmitted information of articulatory features showed that voicing and manner of articulation are comparatively robust cues in the presence of intrinsic variations, whereas the coding of place is more degraded. The database and detailed results have been made available for comparisons between human speech recognition (HSR) and automatic speech recognizers (ASR).
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Simmonds, Anna J
2015-01-01
Rapid vocal motor learning is observed when acquiring a language in early childhood, or learning to speak another language later in life. Accurate pronunciation is one of the hardest things for late learners to master and they are almost always left with a non-native accent. Here, I propose a novel hypothesis that this accent could be improved by optimizing variability in vocal learning brain circuits during learning. Much of the neurobiology of human vocal motor learning has been inferred from studies on songbirds. Jarvis (2004) proposed the hypothesis that as in songbirds there are two pathways in humans: one for learning speech (the striatal vocal learning pathway), and one for production of previously learnt speech (the motor pathway). Learning new motor sequences necessary for accurate non-native pronunciation is challenging and I argue that in late learners of a foreign language the vocal learning pathway becomes inactive prematurely. The motor pathway is engaged once again and learners maintain their original native motor patterns for producing speech, resulting in speaking with a foreign accent. Further, I argue that variability in neural activity within vocal motor circuitry generates vocal variability that supports accurate non-native pronunciation. Recent theoretical and experimental work on motor learning suggests that variability in the motor movement is necessary for the development of expertise. I propose that there is little trial-by-trial variability when using the motor pathway. When using the vocal learning pathway variability gradually increases, reflecting an exploratory phase in which learners try out different ways of pronouncing words, before decreasing and stabilizing once the "best" performance has been identified. The hypothesis proposed here could be tested using behavioral interventions that optimize variability and engage the vocal learning pathway for longer, with the prediction that this would allow learners to develop new motor
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Bilingual children's social preferences hinge on accent.
DeJesus, Jasmine M; Hwang, Hyesung G; Dautel, Jocelyn B; Kinzler, Katherine D
2017-12-01
Past research finds that monolingual and bilingual children prefer native speakers to individuals who speak in unfamiliar foreign languages or accents. Do children in bilingual contexts socially distinguish among familiar languages and accents and, if so, how do their social preferences based on language and accent compare? The current experiments tested whether 5- to 7-year-olds in two bilingual contexts in the United States demonstrate social preferences among the languages and accents that are present in their social environments. We compared children's preferences based on language (i.e., English vs. their other native language) and their preferences based on accent (i.e., English with a native accent vs. English with a non-native [yet familiar] accent). In Experiment 1, children attending a French immersion school demonstrated no preference between English and French speakers but preferred American-accented English to French-accented English. In Experiment 2, bilingual Korean American children demonstrated no preference between English and Korean speakers but preferred American-accented English to Korean-accented English. Across studies, bilingual children's preferences based on accent (i.e., American-accented English over French- or Korean-accented English) were not related to their own language dominance. These results suggest that children from diverse linguistic backgrounds demonstrate social preferences for native-accented speakers. Implications for understanding the potential relation between social reasoning and language acquisition are discussed. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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Liu, Danzheng; Shi, Lu-Feng
2013-06-01
This study established the performance-intensity function for Beijing and Taiwan Mandarin bisyllabic word recognition tests in noise in native speakers of Wu Chinese. Effects of the test dialect and listeners' first language on psychometric variables (i.e., slope and 50%-correct threshold) were analyzed. Thirty-two normal-hearing Wu-speaking adults who used Mandarin since early childhood were compared to 16 native Mandarin-speaking adults. Both Beijing and Taiwan bisyllabic word recognition tests were presented at 8 signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) in 4-dB steps (-12 dB to +16 dB). At each SNR, a half list (25 words) was presented in speech-spectrum noise to listeners' right ear. The order of the test, SNR, and half list was randomized across listeners. Listeners responded orally and in writing. Overall, the Wu-speaking listeners performed comparably to the Mandarin-speaking listeners on both tests. Compared to the Taiwan test, the Beijing test yielded a significantly lower threshold for both the Mandarin- and Wu-speaking listeners, as well as a significantly steeper slope for the Wu-speaking listeners. Both Mandarin tests can be used to evaluate Wu-speaking listeners. Of the 2, the Taiwan Mandarin test results in more comparable functions across listener groups. Differences in the performance-intensity function between listener groups and between tests indicate a first language and dialectal effect, respectively.
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Lai, Ying-Hui; Tsao, Yu; Lu, Xugang; Chen, Fei; Su, Yu-Ting; Chen, Kuang-Chao; Chen, Yu-Hsuan; Chen, Li-Ching; Po-Hung Li, Lieber; Lee, Chin-Hui
2018-01-20
We investigate the clinical effectiveness of a novel deep learning-based noise reduction (NR) approach under noisy conditions with challenging noise types at low signal to noise ratio (SNR) levels for Mandarin-speaking cochlear implant (CI) recipients. The deep learning-based NR approach used in this study consists of two modules: noise classifier (NC) and deep denoising autoencoder (DDAE), thus termed (NC + DDAE). In a series of comprehensive experiments, we conduct qualitative and quantitative analyses on the NC module and the overall NC + DDAE approach. Moreover, we evaluate the speech recognition performance of the NC + DDAE NR and classical single-microphone NR approaches for Mandarin-speaking CI recipients under different noisy conditions. The testing set contains Mandarin sentences corrupted by two types of maskers, two-talker babble noise, and a construction jackhammer noise, at 0 and 5 dB SNR levels. Two conventional NR techniques and the proposed deep learning-based approach are used to process the noisy utterances. We qualitatively compare the NR approaches by the amplitude envelope and spectrogram plots of the processed utterances. Quantitative objective measures include (1) normalized covariance measure to test the intelligibility of the utterances processed by each of the NR approaches; and (2) speech recognition tests conducted by nine Mandarin-speaking CI recipients. These nine CI recipients use their own clinical speech processors during testing. The experimental results of objective evaluation and listening test indicate that under challenging listening conditions, the proposed NC + DDAE NR approach yields higher intelligibility scores than the two compared classical NR techniques, under both matched and mismatched training-testing conditions. When compared to the two well-known conventional NR techniques under challenging listening condition, the proposed NC + DDAE NR approach has superior noise suppression capabilities and gives less distortion
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Grandon , Bénédicte; Yoo , Hiyon
2014-01-01
International audience; French and Korean are two languages with similar prosodic characteristics as far as rhythm and intonation are concerned. In this paper, we present the results of production and perception tests where we describe the prosodic characteristics of Korean L2 learners of French. Our aim is to analyze the impression of "foreign accent" for two prosodic components (intonation and rhythm) of speech produced by Korean L2 learners of French and the perception of this "accent" by ...
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Nan, Yun; Liu, Li; Geiser, Eveline; Shu, Hua; Gong, Chen Chen; Dong, Qi; Gabrieli, John D E; Desimone, Robert
2018-06-25
Musical training confers advantages in speech-sound processing, which could play an important role in early childhood education. To understand the mechanisms of this effect, we used event-related potential and behavioral measures in a longitudinal design. Seventy-four Mandarin-speaking children aged 4-5 y old were pseudorandomly assigned to piano training, reading training, or a no-contact control group. Six months of piano training improved behavioral auditory word discrimination in general as well as word discrimination based on vowels compared with the controls. The reading group yielded similar trends. However, the piano group demonstrated unique advantages over the reading and control groups in consonant-based word discrimination and in enhanced positive mismatch responses (pMMRs) to lexical tone and musical pitch changes. The improved word discrimination based on consonants correlated with the enhancements in musical pitch pMMRs among the children in the piano group. In contrast, all three groups improved equally on general cognitive measures, including tests of IQ, working memory, and attention. The results suggest strengthened common sound processing across domains as an important mechanism underlying the benefits of musical training on language processing. In addition, although we failed to find far-transfer effects of musical training to general cognition, the near-transfer effects to speech perception establish the potential for musical training to help children improve their language skills. Piano training was not inferior to reading training on direct tests of language function, and it even seemed superior to reading training in enhancing consonant discrimination.
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Sequenced subjective accents for brain-computer interfaces
Vlek, R. J.; Schaefer, R. S.; Gielen, C. C. A. M.; Farquhar, J. D. R.; Desain, P.
2011-06-01
Subjective accenting is a cognitive process in which identical auditory pulses at an isochronous rate turn into the percept of an accenting pattern. This process can be voluntarily controlled, making it a candidate for communication from human user to machine in a brain-computer interface (BCI) system. In this study we investigated whether subjective accenting is a feasible paradigm for BCI and how its time-structured nature can be exploited for optimal decoding from non-invasive EEG data. Ten subjects perceived and imagined different metric patterns (two-, three- and four-beat) superimposed on a steady metronome. With an offline classification paradigm, we classified imagined accented from non-accented beats on a single trial (0.5 s) level with an average accuracy of 60.4% over all subjects. We show that decoding of imagined accents is also possible with a classifier trained on perception data. Cyclic patterns of accents and non-accents were successfully decoded with a sequence classification algorithm. Classification performances were compared by means of bit rate. Performance in the best scenario translates into an average bit rate of 4.4 bits min-1 over subjects, which makes subjective accenting a promising paradigm for an online auditory BCI.
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The role of stress and accent in the perception of speech rhythm
Grover, C.N.; Terken, J.M.B.
1995-01-01
Modelling rhythmic characteristics of speech is expected to contribute to the acceptability of synthetic speech. However, before rules for the control of speech rhythm in synthetic speech can be developed, we need to know which properties of speech give rise to the perception of speech rhythm. An
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Accent Identification by Adults with Aphasia
Newton, Caroline; Burns, Rebecca; Bruce, Carolyn
2013-01-01
The UK is a diverse society where individuals regularly interact with speakers with different accents. Whilst there is a growing body of research on the impact of speaker accent on comprehension in people with aphasia, there is none which explores their ability to identify accents. This study investigated the ability of this group to identify the…
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FOREIGN ACCENT PERCEPTION IN PROFESSIONAL DISCOURSE
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Tyurina, S.Yu.
2017-09-01
Full Text Available This paper examines the attitude to the accent in professional discourse. The paper focuses on linguistic approach to accent, thus, the communicative effect of accent in professional discourse is evaluated. Discourse is considered as one of the key concepts of contemporary thinking. The key goal is to study how native speaking and non-native speaking people evaluate the accents in professional sphere. The study is considered to have important implications due to academic and professional mobility. Both quantitative and qualitative methods to collect and analyze data were used. The results of the research may be interesting for phoneticians and ESP teachers.
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Jiang, Cunmei; Hamm, Jeff P; Lim, Vanessa K; Kirk, Ian J; Chen, Xuhai; Yang, Yufang
2012-01-01
Pitch processing is a critical ability on which humans' tonal musical experience depends, and which is also of paramount importance for decoding prosody in speech. Congenital amusia refers to deficits in the ability to properly process musical pitch, and recent evidence has suggested that this musical pitch disorder may impact upon the processing of speech sounds. Here we present the first electrophysiological evidence demonstrating that individuals with amusia who speak Mandarin Chinese are impaired in classifying prosody as appropriate or inappropriate during a speech comprehension task. When presented with inappropriate prosody stimuli, control participants elicited a larger P600 and smaller N100 relative to the appropriate condition. In contrast, amusics did not show significant differences between the appropriate and inappropriate conditions in either the N100 or the P600 component. This provides further evidence that the pitch perception deficits associated with amusia may also affect intonation processing during speech comprehension in those who speak a tonal language such as Mandarin, and suggests music and language share some cognitive and neural resources.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Cunmei Jiang
Full Text Available Pitch processing is a critical ability on which humans' tonal musical experience depends, and which is also of paramount importance for decoding prosody in speech. Congenital amusia refers to deficits in the ability to properly process musical pitch, and recent evidence has suggested that this musical pitch disorder may impact upon the processing of speech sounds. Here we present the first electrophysiological evidence demonstrating that individuals with amusia who speak Mandarin Chinese are impaired in classifying prosody as appropriate or inappropriate during a speech comprehension task. When presented with inappropriate prosody stimuli, control participants elicited a larger P600 and smaller N100 relative to the appropriate condition. In contrast, amusics did not show significant differences between the appropriate and inappropriate conditions in either the N100 or the P600 component. This provides further evidence that the pitch perception deficits associated with amusia may also affect intonation processing during speech comprehension in those who speak a tonal language such as Mandarin, and suggests music and language share some cognitive and neural resources.
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Liu, Fang; Xu, Yi; Patel, Aniruddh D; Francart, Tom; Jiang, Cunmei
2012-08-01
This study examined whether "melodic contour deafness" (insensitivity to the direction of pitch movement) in congenital amusia is associated with specific types of pitch patterns (discrete versus gliding pitches) or stimulus types (speech syllables versus complex tones). Thresholds for identification of pitch direction were obtained using discrete or gliding pitches in the syllable /ma/ or its complex tone analog, from nineteen amusics and nineteen controls, all healthy university students with Mandarin Chinese as their native language. Amusics, unlike controls, had more difficulty recognizing pitch direction in discrete than in gliding pitches, for both speech and non-speech stimuli. Also, amusic thresholds were not significantly affected by stimulus types (speech versus non-speech), whereas controls showed lower thresholds for tones than for speech. These findings help explain why amusics have greater difficulty with discrete musical pitch perception than with speech perception, in which continuously changing pitch movements are prevalent. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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Experiments on Automatic Recognition of Nonnative Arabic Speech
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Douglas O'Shaughnessy
2008-05-01
Full Text Available The automatic recognition of foreign-accented Arabic speech is a challenging task since it involves a large number of nonnative accents. As well, the nonnative speech data available for training are generally insufficient. Moreover, as compared to other languages, the Arabic language has sparked a relatively small number of research efforts. In this paper, we are concerned with the problem of nonnative speech in a speaker independent, large-vocabulary speech recognition system for modern standard Arabic (MSA. We analyze some major differences at the phonetic level in order to determine which phonemes have a significant part in the recognition performance for both native and nonnative speakers. Special attention is given to specific Arabic phonemes. The performance of an HMM-based Arabic speech recognition system is analyzed with respect to speaker gender and its native origin. The WestPoint modern standard Arabic database from the language data consortium (LDC and the hidden Markov Model Toolkit (HTK are used throughout all experiments. Our study shows that the best performance in the overall phoneme recognition is obtained when nonnative speakers are involved in both training and testing phases. This is not the case when a language model and phonetic lattice networks are incorporated in the system. At the phonetic level, the results show that female nonnative speakers perform better than nonnative male speakers, and that emphatic phonemes yield a significant decrease in performance when they are uttered by both male and female nonnative speakers.
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Experiments on Automatic Recognition of Nonnative Arabic Speech
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Selouani Sid-Ahmed
2008-01-01
Full Text Available The automatic recognition of foreign-accented Arabic speech is a challenging task since it involves a large number of nonnative accents. As well, the nonnative speech data available for training are generally insufficient. Moreover, as compared to other languages, the Arabic language has sparked a relatively small number of research efforts. In this paper, we are concerned with the problem of nonnative speech in a speaker independent, large-vocabulary speech recognition system for modern standard Arabic (MSA. We analyze some major differences at the phonetic level in order to determine which phonemes have a significant part in the recognition performance for both native and nonnative speakers. Special attention is given to specific Arabic phonemes. The performance of an HMM-based Arabic speech recognition system is analyzed with respect to speaker gender and its native origin. The WestPoint modern standard Arabic database from the language data consortium (LDC and the hidden Markov Model Toolkit (HTK are used throughout all experiments. Our study shows that the best performance in the overall phoneme recognition is obtained when nonnative speakers are involved in both training and testing phases. This is not the case when a language model and phonetic lattice networks are incorporated in the system. At the phonetic level, the results show that female nonnative speakers perform better than nonnative male speakers, and that emphatic phonemes yield a significant decrease in performance when they are uttered by both male and female nonnative speakers.
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Known-Groups and Concurrent Validity of the Mandarin Tone Identification Test (MTIT.
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Shufeng Zhu
Full Text Available The Mandarin Tone Identification Test (MTIT is a new test designed to assess the tone identification abilities of children with hearing impairment (HI. Evidence for reliability and sensitivity has been reported. The present study aimed to evaluate the known-groups and concurrent validity of the MTIT.The MTIT and Mandarin Pediatric Speech Intelligibility test (MPSI were administered in quiet and in noise conditions. The known-groups validity was evaluated by comparing the performance of the MTIT on children with two different levels of HI. The MPSI was included to evaluate the concurrent validity of the MTIT.81 children with HI were recruited in the present study. They were Mandarin-speaking children with profound HI (mean age = 9; 0, n = 41 and with moderate to severe HI (mean age = 8; 9, n = 40.Scores on the MTIT differed between the two groups with different hearing levels suggesting good known-groups validity. A strong relationship between tone and sentence perception both in quiet and in noise provided preliminary evidence for concurrent validity.The present study confirmed that the MTIT has good known-groups validity and provided preliminary evidence for concurrent validity. The MTIT could be used to evaluate tone identification ability in children with HI with confidence.
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Japanese Attitudes toward English Accents.
Chiba, Reiko; And Others
1995-01-01
Examined the attitudes of 169 Japanese university students toward varieties of spoken English. Results found that the students with more instrumental motivation were more positive toward nonnative English accents than those with less instrumental motivation, and that the students' familiarity with accents had an influence on their acceptance of…
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Vowel and tone recognition in quiet and in noise among Mandarin-speaking amusics.
Tang, Wei; Wang, Xi-Jian; Li, Jia-Qi; Liu, Chang; Dong, Qi; Nan, Yun
2018-03-06
Music and language are two intricately linked communication modalities in humans. A deficit in music pitch processing as manifested in the condition of congenital amusia has been related to difficulties in lexical tone processing for both tone and non-tonal languages. However, it is still unclear whether amusia also affects the perception of vowel phonemes in quiet and in noise. In this study, we examined vowel-plus-tone identification in quiet and noise conditions among Mandarin-speaking amusics with and without speech tone difficulties (tone agnosics and pure amusics, respectively), and IQ- and age-matched controls. Overall, pure amusics showed vowel and tone identification comparable to the controls in both quiet and noise conditions. Compared to pure amusics and controls, tone agnosics showed deficits in tone perception in both quiet and noise conditions. More importantly, their vowel perception was lower than pure amusics and controls in noise conditions, e.g., at a signal-to-noise ratio of -4 dB, although they showed normal-like performance in quiet and at a signal-to-noise ratio of -8 dB. These results suggest that when amusia affected speech tone processing (e.g., tone agnosics), it could also compromise vowel processing in noise. However, amusia alone does not affect tone or vowel perception in Mandarin Chinese either in quiet or in noise. Overall, the current study highlights the necessity of taking heterogeneity within the amusic group into account when considering the related speech deficits in this group. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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Accent detection and social cognition: evidence of protracted learning.
Creel, Sarah C
2018-03-01
How and when do children become aware that speakers have different accents? While adults readily make a variety of subtle social inferences based on speakers' accents, findings from children are more mixed: while one line of research suggests that even infants may be acutely sensitive to accent unfamiliarity, other studies suggest that 5-year-olds have difficulty identifying accents as different from their own. In an attempt to resolve this paradox, the current study assesses American children's sensitivity to American vs. Dutch accents in two situations. First, in an eye-tracked sentence processing paradigm where children have previously shown sensitivity to a salient social distinction (gender) from voice cues, 3-5-year-old children showed no sensitivity to accent differences. Second, in a social decision-making task where accent sensitivity has been found in 5-year-olds, an age gradient appeared, suggesting that familiar accent preferences emerge slowly between 3 and 7 years. Counter to claims that accent is an early, salient signal of social group, results are more consistent with a protracted learning hypothesis that children need extended exposure to native-language sound patterns in order to detect that an accent deviates from their own. A video abstract of this article can be viewed at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQAgy3IFYXA. © 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
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Improving the speech intelligibility in classrooms
Lam, Choi Ling Coriolanus
One of the major acoustical concerns in classrooms is the establishment of effective verbal communication between teachers and students. Non-optimal acoustical conditions, resulting in reduced verbal communication, can cause two main problems. First, they can lead to reduce learning efficiency. Second, they can also cause fatigue, stress, vocal strain and health problems, such as headaches and sore throats, among teachers who are forced to compensate for poor acoustical conditions by raising their voices. Besides, inadequate acoustical conditions can induce the usage of public address system. Improper usage of such amplifiers or loudspeakers can lead to impairment of students' hearing systems. The social costs of poor classroom acoustics will be large to impair the learning of children. This invisible problem has far reaching implications for learning, but is easily solved. Many researches have been carried out that they have accurately and concisely summarized the research findings on classrooms acoustics. Though, there is still a number of challenging questions remaining unanswered. Most objective indices for speech intelligibility are essentially based on studies of western languages. Even several studies of tonal languages as Mandarin have been conducted, there is much less on Cantonese. In this research, measurements have been done in unoccupied rooms to investigate the acoustical parameters and characteristics of the classrooms. The speech intelligibility tests, which based on English, Mandarin and Cantonese, and the survey were carried out on students aged from 5 years old to 22 years old. It aims to investigate the differences in intelligibility between English, Mandarin and Cantonese of the classrooms in Hong Kong. The significance on speech transmission index (STI) related to Phonetically Balanced (PB) word scores will further be developed. Together with developed empirical relationship between the speech intelligibility in classrooms with the variations
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A Mozart is not a Pavarotti: singers outperform instrumentalists on foreign accent imitation.
Christiner, Markus; Reiterer, Susanne Maria
2015-01-01
Recent findings have shown that people with higher musical aptitude were also better in oral language imitation tasks. However, whether singing capacity and instrument playing contribute differently to the imitation of speech has been ignored so far. Research has just recently started to understand that instrumentalists develop quite distinct skills when compared to vocalists. In the same vein the role of the vocal motor system in language acquisition processes has poorly been investigated as most investigations (neurobiological and behavioral) favor to examine speech perception. We set out to test whether the vocal motor system can influence an ability to learn, produce and perceive new languages by contrasting instrumentalists and vocalists. Therefore, we investigated 96 participants, 27 instrumentalists, 33 vocalists and 36 non-musicians/non-singers. They were tested for their abilities to imitate foreign speech: unknown language (Hindi), second language (English) and their musical aptitude. Results revealed that both instrumentalists and vocalists have a higher ability to imitate unintelligible speech and foreign accents than non-musicians/non-singers. Within the musician group, vocalists outperformed instrumentalists significantly. First, adaptive plasticity for speech imitation is not reliant on audition alone but also on vocal-motor induced processes. Second, vocal flexibility of singers goes together with higher speech imitation aptitude. Third, vocal motor training, as of singers, may speed up foreign language acquisition processes.
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Liu, Pan; Pell, Marc D
2012-12-01
To establish a valid database of vocal emotional stimuli in Mandarin Chinese, a set of Chinese pseudosentences (i.e., semantically meaningless sentences that resembled real Chinese) were produced by four native Mandarin speakers to express seven emotional meanings: anger, disgust, fear, sadness, happiness, pleasant surprise, and neutrality. These expressions were identified by a group of native Mandarin listeners in a seven-alternative forced choice task, and items reaching a recognition rate of at least three times chance performance in the seven-choice task were selected as a valid database and then subjected to acoustic analysis. The results demonstrated expected variations in both perceptual and acoustic patterns of the seven vocal emotions in Mandarin. For instance, fear, anger, sadness, and neutrality were associated with relatively high recognition, whereas happiness, disgust, and pleasant surprise were recognized less accurately. Acoustically, anger and pleasant surprise exhibited relatively high mean f0 values and large variation in f0 and amplitude; in contrast, sadness, disgust, fear, and neutrality exhibited relatively low mean f0 values and small amplitude variations, and happiness exhibited a moderate mean f0 value and f0 variation. Emotional expressions varied systematically in speech rate and harmonics-to-noise ratio values as well. This validated database is available to the research community and will contribute to future studies of emotional prosody for a number of purposes. To access the database, please contact pan.liu@mail.mcgill.ca.
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[Stimuli phrases of adductor spasmodic dysphonia phonatory break in mandarin Chinese].
Ge, Pingjiang; Ren, Qingyi; Chen, Zhipeng; Cheng, Qiuhui; Sheng, Xiaoli; Wang, Ling; Chen, Shaohua; Zhang, Siyi
2015-12-01
To investigate the characteristics of adductor spasmodic dysphonia phonatory break in mandarin Chinese and select the stimuli phrases. Thirty-eight patients with adductor spasmodic dysphonia were involved in this study. Standard phrase " fù mŭ xīn" and a speech corpus in mandarin Chinese with 229 syllables covering all vowel and constant of mandarin Chinese were selected. Every patient read the phrases above twice in normal speed and comfortable voice. Two auditory perpetual speech pathologists marked phonatory break syllables respectively. The frequency of phonatory break syllables and their located phrases were calculated, rated and described. The phrases including the most phonatory break syllables were selected as stimuli phrases, the phonatory break frequency of which was also higher than that of standard phrase "fù mŭ xīn". Phonatory break happened in the reading of all patients. The average number of phonatory break syllables was 14 (3-33). Phonatroy break occurred when saying 177 (77.3%) syllables in the speech corpus. The syllables "guŏ, rén, zāng, diàn, chē, gè, guăn, a, bā, ne, de" broke in 23.1%-41.0% patients. These syllables belonged to the phrases "pĭng guŏ, huŏ chē, shì de, nĭ shì gè hăo rén, wŏ mén shì yŏu zŏng shì bă qĭn shì nong dé hĕn zāng, wŏ mén nà biān yŏu wăng qiú yùn dong chăng, cān gŭan, jiŭ bā hé yī gè miàn bāo dìan, tā shì duō me kāng kăi a,wŏ yīng gāi zài xìn lĭ xiĕ yī xiē shén mē ne?". Thirty-seven patients (97.3%) had phonatory break in above mentioned words. Ratios of these words phonatory break also were more than "fù mŭ xīn". Adductor spasmodic dysphonic patients exhibited different degrees of phonatory break in mandarine Chinese. The phrases" shì de, pĭng guŏ, huŏ chē, nĭ shì gè hăo rén, wŏ mén nà biān yŏu wăng qiú yùn dong chăng, cān gŭan, jiŭ bā hé yī gè miàn bāo dìan, tā shì duō me kāng kăi a" were recommended as stimuli
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Talker-specific learning in amnesia: Insight into mechanisms of adaptive speech perception.
Trude, Alison M; Duff, Melissa C; Brown-Schmidt, Sarah
2014-05-01
A hallmark of human speech perception is the ability to comprehend speech quickly and effortlessly despite enormous variability across talkers. However, current theories of speech perception do not make specific claims about the memory mechanisms involved in this process. To examine whether declarative memory is necessary for talker-specific learning, we tested the ability of amnesic patients with severe declarative memory deficits to learn and distinguish the accents of two unfamiliar talkers by monitoring their eye-gaze as they followed spoken instructions. Analyses of the time-course of eye fixations showed that amnesic patients rapidly learned to distinguish these accents and tailored perceptual processes to the voice of each talker. These results demonstrate that declarative memory is not necessary for this ability and points to the involvement of non-declarative memory mechanisms. These results are consistent with findings that other social and accommodative behaviors are preserved in amnesia and contribute to our understanding of the interactions of multiple memory systems in the use and understanding of spoken language. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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Musical expertise and foreign speech perception.
Martínez-Montes, Eduardo; Hernández-Pérez, Heivet; Chobert, Julie; Morgado-Rodríguez, Lisbet; Suárez-Murias, Carlos; Valdés-Sosa, Pedro A; Besson, Mireille
2013-01-01
The aim of this experiment was to investigate the influence of musical expertise on the automatic perception of foreign syllables and harmonic sounds. Participants were Cuban students with high level of expertise in music or in visual arts and with the same level of general education and socio-economic background. We used a multi-feature Mismatch Negativity (MMN) design with sequences of either syllables in Mandarin Chinese or harmonic sounds, both comprising deviants in pitch contour, duration and Voice Onset Time (VOT) or equivalent that were either far from (Large deviants) or close to (Small deviants) the standard. For both Mandarin syllables and harmonic sounds, results were clear-cut in showing larger MMNs to pitch contour deviants in musicians than in visual artists. Results were less clear for duration and VOT deviants, possibly because of the specific characteristics of the stimuli. Results are interpreted as reflecting similar processing of pitch contour in speech and non-speech sounds. The implications of these results for understanding the influence of intense musical training from childhood to adulthood and of genetic predispositions for music on foreign language perception are discussed.
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Musical expertise and foreign speech perception
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Eduardo eMartínez-Montes
2013-11-01
Full Text Available The aim of this experiment was to investigate the influence of musical expertise on the automatic perception of foreign syllables and harmonic sounds. Participants were Cuban students with high level of expertise in music or in visual arts and with the same level of general education and socio-economic background. We used a multi-feature Mismatch Negativity (MMN design with sequences of either syllables in Mandarin Chinese or harmonic sounds, both comprising deviants in pitch contour, duration and Voice Onset Time (VOT or equivalent that were either far from (Large deviants or close to (Small deviants the standard. For both Mandarin syllables and harmonic sounds, results were clear-cut in showing larger MMNs to pitch contour deviants in musicians than in visual artists. Results were less clear for duration and VOT deviants, possibly because of the specific characteristics of the stimuli. Results are interpreted as reflecting similar processing of pitch contour in speech and non-speech sounds. The implications of these results for understanding the influence of intense musical training from childhood to adulthood and of genetic predispositions for music on foreign language perception is discussed.
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Effects of low harmonics on tone identification in natural and vocoded speech.
Liu, Chang; Azimi, Behnam; Tahmina, Qudsia; Hu, Yi
2012-11-01
This study investigated the contribution of low-frequency harmonics to identifying Mandarin tones in natural and vocoded speech in quiet and noisy conditions. Results showed that low-frequency harmonics of natural speech led to highly accurate tone identification; however, for vocoded speech, low-frequency harmonics yielded lower tone identification than stimuli with full harmonics, except for tone 4. Analysis of the correlation between tone accuracy and the amplitude-F0 correlation index suggested that "more" speech contents (i.e., more harmonics) did not necessarily yield better tone recognition for vocoded speech, especially when the amplitude contour of the signals did not co-vary with the F0 contour.
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Tuning Neural Phase Entrainment to Speech.
Falk, Simone; Lanzilotti, Cosima; Schön, Daniele
2017-08-01
Musical rhythm positively impacts on subsequent speech processing. However, the neural mechanisms underlying this phenomenon are so far unclear. We investigated whether carryover effects from a preceding musical cue to a speech stimulus result from a continuation of neural phase entrainment to periodicities that are present in both music and speech. Participants listened and memorized French metrical sentences that contained (quasi-)periodic recurrences of accents and syllables. Speech stimuli were preceded by a rhythmically regular or irregular musical cue. Our results show that the presence of a regular cue modulates neural response as estimated by EEG power spectral density, intertrial coherence, and source analyses at critical frequencies during speech processing compared with the irregular condition. Importantly, intertrial coherences for regular cues were indicative of the participants' success in memorizing the subsequent speech stimuli. These findings underscore the highly adaptive nature of neural phase entrainment across fundamentally different auditory stimuli. They also support current models of neural phase entrainment as a tool of predictive timing and attentional selection across cognitive domains.
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Accents in the workplace: their effects during a job interview.
Deprez-Sims, Anne-Sophie; Morris, Scott B
2010-12-01
As the workplace becomes increasingly global, organizations are more likely to employ persons from other countries whose accents clearly identify them as different from the local workforce. Understanding the impact of accents in the workplace is important because accents can be salient in the same way as ethnicity, age, gender, and skin color and may be a source of employment discrimination. The present study looked at the influence of accents on the evaluation of job applicants during an interview for a human resource manager position. Participants from the US were asked to evaluate an applicant with one of three accents (Midwestern US, French, Colombian) by listening to an audiofile. The results showed that the applicant with the Midwestern US accent was evaluated more positively than the applicant with the French accent; however, the applicant with the Colombian accent did not receive an evaluation that differed significantly from those given to the applicants with either the French or the Midwestern US accent. Analyses of process variables indicated that the bias against the French-accented applicant was mediated by perceived lower similarity. These results are consistent with the similarity-attraction hypothesis, which states that demographic variables will impact judgments to the extent to which they make the decision-maker view the applicant as similar or dissimilar. The ability of accent to trigger bias highlights the importance of considering the full array of characteristics that can lead to discrimination in employment settings. Research on employment discrimination has traditionally focused on visual cues such as gender and ethnicity, but in an interview situation, the way the applicant speaks is also important.
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Taste and aroma of fresh and stored mandarins.
Tietel, Zipora; Plotto, Anne; Fallik, Elazar; Lewinsohn, Efraim; Porat, Ron
2011-01-15
During the last decade there has been a continuous rise in consumption of fresh easy-to-peel mandarins. However, mandarins are much more perishable than other citrus fruit, mainly due to rapid deterioration in sensory acceptability after harvest. In the current review we discuss the biochemical components involved in forming the unique flavor of mandarins, and how postharvest storage operations influence taste and aroma and consequently consumer sensory acceptability. What we perceive as mandarin flavor is actually the combination of basic taste, aroma and mouth-feel. The taste of mandarins is principally governed by the levels of sugars and acids in the juice sacs and the relative ratios among them, whereas the aroma of mandarins is derived from a mixture of different aroma volatiles, including alcohols, aldehydes, ketones, terpenes/hydrocarbons and esters. During postharvest storage and marketing there is a gradual decrease in mandarin sensory acceptability, which has been attributed to decreases in acidity and typical mandarin flavor, paralleling an accumulation of off-flavor. Biochemical analysis of volatile and non-volatile constituents in mandarin juice demonstrated that these changes in sensory acceptability were concomitant with decreases in acidity and content of terpenes and aldehydes, which provide green, piney and citrus aroma on the one hand, and increases in ethanol fermentation metabolism products and esters on the other, which are likely to cause 'overripe' and off-flavors. Overall, we demonstrate the vast importance of the genetic background, maturity stage at harvest, commercial postharvest operation treatments, including curing, degreening and waxing, and storage duration on mandarin sensory quality. Copyright © 2010 Society of Chemical Industry.
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Consumer preference for mandarins: Implications of a sensory analysis
While consumption of mandarins has grown steadily in the United States, mandarin cultivars being produced and consumed have been changing. The goal of this research is to identify factors that impact consumer choice of mandarins. In this analysis, consumers were presented with multiple mandarins for...
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Singh, Leher; Fu, Charlene S L; Seet, Xian Hui; Tong, Ashley P Y; Wang, Joelle L; Best, Catherine T
2018-09-01
Most languages use lexical tone to discriminate the meanings of words. There has been recent interest in tracking the development of tone categories during infancy. These studies have focused largely on monolingual infants learning either a tone language or a non-tone language. It remains to be seen how bilingual infants learning one tone language (e.g., Mandarin) and one non-tone language (e.g., English) discriminate tones. Here, we examined infants' discrimination of two Mandarin tones pairs: one salient and one subtle. Discrimination was investigated in three groups: Mandarin-English bilinguals, English monolinguals, and Mandarin monolinguals at 6 months and 9 months of age in a cross-sectional design. Results demonstrated relatively strong Mandarin tone discrimination in Mandarin monolinguals, with salient tone discrimination at 6 months and both salient and subtle tone discrimination at 9 months. English monolinguals discriminated neither contrast at 6 months but discriminated the salient contrast at 9 months. Surprisingly, there was no evidence for tone discrimination in Mandarin-English bilingual infants. In a second experiment, 12- and 13-month-old Mandarin-English bilingual and English monolingual infants were tested to determine whether bilinguals would demonstrate tone sensitivity at a later age. Results revealed a lack of tone sensitivity at 12 or 13 months in bilingual infants, yet English monolingual infants were sensitive to both salient and subtle Mandarin tone contrasts at 12 or 13 months. Our findings provide evidence for age-related convergence in Mandarin tone discrimination in English and Mandarin monolingual infants and for a distinct pattern of tone discrimination in bilingual infants. Theoretical implications for phonetic category acquisition are discussed. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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Mandarin fruit quality: a review.
Goldenberg, Livnat; Yaniv, Yossi; Porat, Ron; Carmi, Nir
2018-01-01
During the last decade, there has been a continuous rise in consumption and global marketing of fresh, easy-to-peel mandarins, with current annual production of nearly 29 million tons. Nevertheless, most of the existing knowledge on quality traits of citrus fruit comes from research conducted on oranges and grapefruit, which are the main products for the citrus juice manufacturing industry; relatively little is yet known regarding the unique fruit quality traits of mandarins, nor about the great diversity in these traits among the various natural sub-groups and varieties of mandarins. In the present review we discuss the physiological, biochemical, and molecular factors governing key fruit quality attributes of mandarins, including fruit colour, size and shape, ease of peeling, seedlessness, flavour, and nutritional quality. Fruit colour, size, and shape contribute to external appearance; peelability and seedlessness to ease of consumption; and flavour and nutritional quality to internal quality. © 2017 Society of Chemical Industry. © 2017 Society of Chemical Industry.
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Vowel production of Mandarin-speaking hearing aid users with different types of hearing loss.
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Yu-Chen Hung
Full Text Available In contrast with previous research focusing on cochlear implants, this study examined the speech performance of hearing aid users with conductive (n = 11, mixed (n = 10, and sensorineural hearing loss (n = 7 and compared it with the speech of hearing control. Speech intelligibility was evaluated by computing the vowel space area defined by the Mandarin Chinese corner vowels /a, u, i/. The acoustic differences between the vowels were assessed using the Euclidean distance. The results revealed that both the conductive and mixed hearing loss groups exhibited a reduced vowel working space, but no significant difference was found between the sensorineural hearing loss and normal hearing groups. An analysis using the Euclidean distance further showed that the compression of vowel space area in conductive hearing loss can be attributed to the substantial lowering of the second formant of /i/. The differences in vowel production between groups are discussed in terms of the occlusion effect and the signal transmission media of various hearing devices.
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The influence of talker and foreign-accent variability on spoken word identification.
Bent, Tessa; Holt, Rachael Frush
2013-03-01
In spoken word identification and memory tasks, stimulus variability from numerous sources impairs performance. In the current study, the influence of foreign-accent variability on spoken word identification was evaluated in two experiments. Experiment 1 used a between-subjects design to test word identification in noise in single-talker and two multiple-talker conditions: multiple talkers with the same accent and multiple talkers with different accents. Identification performance was highest in the single-talker condition, but there was no difference between the single-accent and multiple-accent conditions. Experiment 2 further explored word recognition for multiple talkers in single-accent versus multiple-accent conditions using a mixed design. A detriment to word recognition was observed in the multiple-accent condition compared to the single-accent condition, but the effect differed across the language backgrounds tested. These results demonstrate that the processing of foreign-accent variation may influence word recognition in ways similar to other sources of variability (e.g., speaking rate or style) in that the inclusion of multiple foreign accents can result in a small but significant performance decrement beyond the multiple-talker effect.
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Jiang, Cunmei; Hamm, Jeff P.; Lim, Vanessa K.; Kirk, Ian J.; Chen, Xuhai; Yang, Yufang
2012-01-01
Pitch processing is a critical ability on which humans' tonal musical experience depends, and which is also of paramount importance for decoding prosody in speech. Congenital amusia refers to deficits in the ability to properly process musical pitch, and recent evidence has suggested that this musical pitch disorder may impact upon the processing of speech sounds. Here we present the first electrophysiological evidence demonstrating that individuals with amusia who speak Mandarin Chinese are ...
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Detection of target phonemes in spontaneous and read speech.
Mehta, G; Cutler, A
1988-01-01
Although spontaneous speech occurs more frequently in most listeners' experience than read speech, laboratory studies of human speech recognition typically use carefully controlled materials read from a script. The phonological and prosodic characteristics of spontaneous and read speech differ considerably, however, which suggests that laboratory results may not generalise to the recognition of spontaneous speech. In the present study listeners were presented with both spontaneous and read speech materials, and their response time to detect word-initial target phonemes was measured. Responses were, overall, equally fast in each speech mode. However, analysis of effects previously reported in phoneme detection studies revealed significant differences between speech modes. In read speech but not in spontaneous speech, later targets were detected more rapidly than targets preceded by short words. In contrast, in spontaneous speech but not in read speech, targets were detected more rapidly in accented than in unaccented words and in strong than in weak syllables. An explanation for this pattern is offered in terms of characteristic prosodic differences between spontaneous and read speech. The results support claims from previous work that listeners pay great attention to prosodic information in the process of recognising speech.
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DEFF Research Database (Denmark)
Berger, Stephanie; Niebuhr, Oliver; Fischer, Kerstin
2018-01-01
The research initiative Innovating Speech EliCitation Techniques (INSPECT) aims to describe and quantify how recording methods, situations and materials influence speech produc-tion in lab-speech experiments. On this basis, INSPECT aims to develop methods that reliably stimulate specific patterns...... and styles of speech, like expressive or conversational speech or different types emphatic accents. The present study investigates if and how different text highlighting methods (yellow background, bold, capital letter, italics, and underlining) make speakers reinforce the level of perceived prominence...
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The development of visual speech perception in Mandarin Chinese-speaking children.
Chen, Liang; Lei, Jianghua
2017-01-01
The present study aimed to investigate the development of visual speech perception in Chinese-speaking children. Children aged 7, 13 and 16 were asked to visually identify both consonant and vowel sounds in Chinese as quickly and accurately as possible. Results revealed (1) an increase in accuracy of visual speech perception between ages 7 and 13 after which the accuracy rate either stagnates or drops; and (2) a U-shaped development pattern in speed of perception with peak performance in 13-year olds. Results also showed that across all age groups, the overall levels of accuracy rose, whereas the response times fell for simplex finals, complex finals and initials. These findings suggest that (1) visual speech perception in Chinese is a developmental process that is acquired over time and is still fine-tuned well into late adolescence; (2) factors other than cross-linguistic differences in phonological complexity and degrees of reliance on visual information are involved in development of visual speech perception.
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On English Speakers' Ability to Communicate Emotion in Mandarin
Jian, Hua-Li
2015-01-01
The ability of Mandarin learners to express emotion in Mandarin has received little attention. This study examines how English L1 users express emotions in Mandarin and how this expression differs from that of Mandarin L1 users. Scenarios were adopted to elicit joy, anger, sadness, fear, and neutrality. Both groups articulated anger, joy, and fear…
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Focus, accent, and argument structure: effects on language comprehension.
Birch, S; Clifton, C
1995-01-01
Four experiments investigated the effect of syntactic argument structure on the evaluation and comprehension of utterances with different patterns of pitch accents. Linguistic analyses of the relation between focus and prosody note that it is possible for certain accented constituents within a broadly focused phrase to project focus to the entire phrase. We manipulated focus requirements and accent in recorded question-answer pairs and asked listeners to make linguistic judgments of prosodic appropriateness (Experiments 1 and 3) or to make judgments based on meaningful comprehension (Experiments 2 and 4). Naive judgments of prosodic appropriateness were generally consistent with the linguistic analyses, showing preferences for utterances in which contextually new noun phrases received accent and old noun phrases did not, but suggested that an accented new argument NP was not fully effective in projecting broad focus to the entire VP. However, the comprehension experiments did demonstrate that comprehension of a sentence with broad VP focus was as efficient when only a lexical argument NP received accent as when both NP and verb received accent. Such focus projection did not occur when the argument NP was an "independent quantifier" such as nobody or everything. The results extend existing demonstrations that the ease of understanding spoken discourse depends on appropriate intonational marking of focus to cases where certain structurally-defined words can project focus-marking to an entire phrase.
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Motivasi Belajar Bahasa Mandarin sebagai Bahasa Kedua
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Yi Ying
2013-10-01
Full Text Available The goals of article was to explore students’ main motivation in learning Mandarin as second language acquisition and the difference motivation between Chinese-descending and non-chinese students. There were 276 respondents chosen by purposive sampling from three universities. They were students from Mandarin Department of Bina Nusantara University, Jakarta, Darma Persada University, Jakarta, and North Sumatera University, Medan. A cooperation on deciding research instruments was collaborated with Faculty of Tionghoa Language and Literature of Huaqiau University, China. Descriptive analysis was done to explore students’ main motivation in learning Mandarin, continued by different tests to know the different motivation between native and descending students. Research results indicated that the motivation in learning language is low; there is no significant difference between integrative and instrumental motivation. Also, there was no motivation significant different between chinese-descending dan non-chinese students in learning Mandarin. Lecturers should develop their methods of teaching to develop students’ learning motivation in learning Mandarin.
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Culturally diverse attitudes and beliefs of students majoring in speech-language pathology.
Franca, Maria Claudia; Smith, Linda McCabe; Nichols, Jane Luanne; Balan, Dianna Santos
Academic education in speech-language pathology should prepare students to provide professional services that mirror current knowledge, skills, and scope of practice in a pluralistic society. This study seeks to examine the impact of speech-language pathology (SLP) students prior multicultural experiences and previous formal education on attitudes and beliefs toward language diversity. A survey to investigate SLP students attitudes toward language diversity was applied. After the research study and instructions to complete the consent form questionnaire was presented by a research assistant, an announcement was given by a graduate student who speaks English as a second language with an accent. The participants then completed a questionnaire containing questions related to attitudes about the presentation of the announcement in particular and toward language diversity in general. Responses suggested a relationship between self-reported cultural bias and ability to concentrate on speech with an accent, and the extent of interaction with individuals from a cultural and linguistic diverse (CLD) background. Additional outcomes revealed that cultural bias may be predicted by factors related to amount of CLD exposure. Results of this study indicated critical areas that need to be considered when developing curricula in speech-language pathology programs. The results will be useful in determining procedures applicable in larger investigations, and encourage future research on attitudes and beliefs toward aspects of cultural diversity.
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Hsu, Hsiu-Ling
2017-08-01
We conducted three experiments investigating in more detail the interaction between the two effects of bilingualism and L1-L2 similarity in the speech performance of balanced and unbalanced bilinguals. In Experiment 1, L1 Mandarin monolinguals and two groups of Hakka and Minnan balanced bilinguals (Hakka: more similar to Mandarin) performed a non-contextual single-character reading task in Mandarin, which required more inhibitory control. The two bilingual groups outperformed the monolinguals, regardless of their L1 background. However, the bilingual advantage was not found in a contextual multi-word task (Experiment 2), but instead the effect of cross-linguistic similarity emerged. Furthermore, in Experiment 3, the Hakka unbalanced bilinguals showed an advantage in the non-contextual task, while their Minnan counterparts did not, and the impact of L1-L2 similarity emerged in both tasks. These results unveiled the way the two effects dynamically interplayed depending on the task contexts and the relative degrees of using L1 and L2.
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Two French-Speaking Cases of Foreign Accent Syndrome: An Acoustic-Phonetic Analysis
Roy, Johanna-Pascale; Macoir, Joel; Martel-Sauvageau, Vincent; Boudreault, Carol-Ann
2012-01-01
Foreign accent syndrome (FAS) is an acquired neurologic disorder in which an individual suddenly and unintentionally speaks with an accent which is perceived as being different from his/her usual accent. This study presents an acoustic-phonetic description of two Quebec French-speaking cases. The first speaker presents a perceived accent shift to…
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Brebner, Chris; McCormack, Paul; Rickard Liow, Susan
2016-01-01
Background: The phonological and morphosyntactic structures of English and Mandarin contrast maximally and an increasing number of bilinguals speak these two languages. Speech and language therapists need to understand bilingual development for children speaking these languages in order reliably to assess and provide intervention for this…
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Analysis of Feature Extraction Methods for Speaker Dependent Speech Recognition
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Gurpreet Kaur
2017-02-01
Full Text Available Speech recognition is about what is being said, irrespective of who is saying. Speech recognition is a growing field. Major progress is taking place on the technology of automatic speech recognition (ASR. Still, there are lots of barriers in this field in terms of recognition rate, background noise, speaker variability, speaking rate, accent etc. Speech recognition rate mainly depends on the selection of features and feature extraction methods. This paper outlines the feature extraction techniques for speaker dependent speech recognition for isolated words. A brief survey of different feature extraction techniques like Mel-Frequency Cepstral Coefficients (MFCC, Linear Predictive Coding Coefficients (LPCC, Perceptual Linear Prediction (PLP, Relative Spectra Perceptual linear Predictive (RASTA-PLP analysis are presented and evaluation is done. Speech recognition has various applications from daily use to commercial use. We have made a speaker dependent system and this system can be useful in many areas like controlling a patient vehicle using simple commands.
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Wang, Hsiao-Lan S; Chen, I-Chen; Chiang, Chun-Han; Lai, Ying-Hui; Tsao, Yu
2016-10-01
The current study examined the associations between basic auditory perception, speech prosodic processing, and vocabulary development in Chinese kindergartners, specifically, whether early basic auditory perception may be related to linguistic prosodic processing in Chinese Mandarin vocabulary acquisition. A series of language, auditory, and linguistic prosodic tests were given to 100 preschool children who had not yet learned how to read Chinese characters. The results suggested that lexical tone sensitivity and intonation production were significantly correlated with children's general vocabulary abilities. In particular, tone awareness was associated with comprehensive language development, whereas intonation production was associated with both comprehensive and expressive language development. Regression analyses revealed that tone sensitivity accounted for 36% of the unique variance in vocabulary development, whereas intonation production accounted for 6% of the variance in vocabulary development. Moreover, auditory frequency discrimination was significantly correlated with lexical tone sensitivity, syllable duration discrimination, and intonation production in Mandarin Chinese. Also it provided significant contributions to tone sensitivity and intonation production. Auditory frequency discrimination may indirectly affect early vocabulary development through Chinese speech prosody. © The Author(s) 2016.
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The study on preservation of Nanfeng mandarin by radiation
International Nuclear Information System (INIS)
Liu Zhifang; Luo Gui; Xiong Meihua; Chen Shule; Human Rukai; Wan Ziyu
1988-01-01
The Nan Feng Mandarin is a special native product to Jiangxi province in China. It's characterized by thin rind with few pits, much juice without dregs, good taste of sweet, fragrance and sour in goden color. However it can not be stored for a long time because of its thin rind and much juice. The effect of the radiation on the preservation of the Nan Feng Mandarin was studied. The results showed that when the mandarin was stored at a room temperature for 100-200 days and irradiated at a low dose of 60 Co ray, the rate of good one was up to the 80%, and 10-15% highter than that of the controlled Mandarin. But any distinct change of main chemical compositions of the irradiated Mandarin haven't been found by examining. In addition, the mechanism of the radiation on the presevation of the Nan Feng Mandarin was also discussed
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What makes a rhythm complex? The influence of musical training and accent type on beat perception.
Bouwer, Fleur L; Burgoyne, J Ashley; Odijk, Daan; Honing, Henkjan; Grahn, Jessica A
2018-01-01
Perception of a regular beat in music is inferred from different types of accents. For example, increases in loudness cause intensity accents, and the grouping of time intervals in a rhythm creates temporal accents. Accents are expected to occur on the beat: when accents are "missing" on the beat, the beat is more difficult to find. However, it is unclear whether accents occurring off the beat alter beat perception similarly to missing accents on the beat. Moreover, no one has examined whether intensity accents influence beat perception more or less strongly than temporal accents, nor how musical expertise affects sensitivity to each type of accent. In two experiments, we obtained ratings of difficulty in finding the beat in rhythms with either temporal or intensity accents, and which varied in the number of accents on the beat as well as the number of accents off the beat. In both experiments, the occurrence of accents on the beat facilitated beat detection more in musical experts than in musical novices. In addition, the number of accents on the beat affected beat finding more in rhythms with temporal accents than in rhythms with intensity accents. The effect of accents off the beat was much weaker than the effect of accents on the beat and appeared to depend on musical expertise, as well as on the number of accents on the beat: when many accents on the beat are missing, beat perception is quite difficult, and adding accents off the beat may not reduce beat perception further. Overall, the different types of accents were processed qualitatively differently, depending on musical expertise. Therefore, these findings indicate the importance of designing ecologically valid stimuli when testing beat perception in musical novices, who may need different types of accent information than musical experts to be able to find a beat. Furthermore, our findings stress the importance of carefully designing rhythms for social and clinical applications of beat perception, as not
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Li, X; Yang, Y; Ren, G
2009-06-16
Language is often perceived together with visual information. Recent experimental evidences indicated that, during spoken language comprehension, the brain can immediately integrate visual information with semantic or syntactic information from speech. Here we used the mismatch negativity to further investigate whether prosodic information from speech could be immediately integrated into a visual scene context or not, and especially the time course and automaticity of this integration process. Sixteen Chinese native speakers participated in the study. The materials included Chinese spoken sentences and picture pairs. In the audiovisual situation, relative to the concomitant pictures, the spoken sentence was appropriately accented in the standard stimuli, but inappropriately accented in the two kinds of deviant stimuli. In the purely auditory situation, the speech sentences were presented without pictures. It was found that the deviants evoked mismatch responses in both audiovisual and purely auditory situations; the mismatch negativity in the purely auditory situation peaked at the same time as, but was weaker than that evoked by the same deviant speech sounds in the audiovisual situation. This pattern of results suggested immediate integration of prosodic information from speech and visual information from pictures in the absence of focused attention.
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Control of Microcystis aeruginosa TH01109 with batangas mandarin ...
African Journals Online (AJOL)
We studied the inhibitory effects of batangas mandarin skin and dwarf banana peel on Microcystis aeruginosa. In laboratory assays, algal growth was significantly inhibited by the addition of mandarin skin extract (0.1% w/v). When the concentration of mandarin skin increased to 0.5% (w/v), no algal growth was detected, ...
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Constraints on the Transfer of Perceptual Learning in Accented Speech
Eisner, Frank; Melinger, Alissa; Weber, Andrea
2013-01-01
The perception of speech sounds can be re-tuned through a mechanism of lexically driven perceptual learning after exposure to instances of atypical speech production. This study asked whether this re-tuning is sensitive to the position of the atypical sound within the word. We investigated perceptual learning using English voiced stop consonants, which are commonly devoiced in word-final position by Dutch learners of English. After exposure to a Dutch learner’s productions of devoiced stops in word-final position (but not in any other positions), British English (BE) listeners showed evidence of perceptual learning in a subsequent cross-modal priming task, where auditory primes with devoiced final stops (e.g., “seed”, pronounced [si:th]), facilitated recognition of visual targets with voiced final stops (e.g., SEED). In Experiment 1, this learning effect generalized to test pairs where the critical contrast was in word-initial position, e.g., auditory primes such as “town” facilitated recognition of visual targets like DOWN. Control listeners, who had not heard any stops by the speaker during exposure, showed no learning effects. The generalization to word-initial position did not occur when participants had also heard correctly voiced, word-initial stops during exposure (Experiment 2), and when the speaker was a native BE speaker who mimicked the word-final devoicing (Experiment 3). The readiness of the perceptual system to generalize a previously learned adjustment to other positions within the word thus appears to be modulated by distributional properties of the speech input, as well as by the perceived sociophonetic characteristics of the speaker. The results suggest that the transfer of pre-lexical perceptual adjustments that occur through lexically driven learning can be affected by a combination of acoustic, phonological, and sociophonetic factors. PMID:23554598
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Bilingual and Monolingual Children Prefer Native-Accented Speakers
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Andre L. eSouza
2013-12-01
Full Text Available Adults and young children prefer to affiliate with some individuals rather than others. Studies have shown that monolingual children show in-group biases for individuals who speak their native language without a foreign accent (Kinzler, Dupoux, & Spelke, 2007. Some studies have suggested that bilingual children are less influenced than monolinguals by language variety when attributing personality traits to different speakers (Anisfeld & Lambert, 1964, which could indicate that bilinguals have fewer in-group biases and perhaps greater social flexibility. However, no previous studies have compared monolingual and bilingual children’s reactions to speakers with unfamiliar foreign accents. In the present study, we investigated the social preferences of 5-year-old English and French monolinguals and English-French bilinguals. Contrary to our predictions, both monolingual and bilingual preschoolers preferred to be friends with native-accented speakers over speakers who spoke their dominant language with an unfamiliar foreign accent. This result suggests that both monolingual and bilingual children have strong preferences for in-group members who use a familiar language variety, and that bilingualism does not lead to generalized social flexibility.
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Bilingual and monolingual children prefer native-accented speakers.
Souza, André L; Byers-Heinlein, Krista; Poulin-Dubois, Diane
2013-01-01
Adults and young children prefer to affiliate with some individuals rather than others. Studies have shown that monolingual children show in-group biases for individuals who speak their native language without a foreign accent (Kinzler et al., 2007). Some studies have suggested that bilingual children are less influenced than monolinguals by language variety when attributing personality traits to different speakers (Anisfeld and Lambert, 1964), which could indicate that bilinguals have fewer in-group biases and perhaps greater social flexibility. However, no previous studies have compared monolingual and bilingual children's reactions to speakers with unfamiliar foreign accents. In the present study, we investigated the social preferences of 5-year-old English and French monolinguals and English-French bilinguals. Contrary to our predictions, both monolingual and bilingual preschoolers preferred to be friends with native-accented speakers over speakers who spoke their dominant language with an unfamiliar foreign accent. This result suggests that both monolingual and bilingual children have strong preferences for in-group members who use a familiar language variety, and that bilingualism does not lead to generalized social flexibility.
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Aerosol emission during human speech
Asadi, Sima; Wexler, Anthony S.; Cappa, Christopher D.; Bouvier, Nicole M.; Barreda-Castanon, Santiago; Ristenpart, William D.
2017-11-01
We show that the rate of aerosol particle emission during healthy human speech is strongly correlated with the loudness (amplitude) of vocalization. Emission rates range from approximately 1 to 50 particles per second for quiet to loud amplitudes, regardless of language spoken (English, Spanish, Mandarin, or Arabic). Intriguingly, a small fraction of individuals behave as ``super emitters,'' consistently emitting an order of magnitude more aerosol particles than their peers. We interpret the results in terms of the eggressive flowrate during vocalization, which is known to vary significantly for different types of vocalization and for different individuals. The results suggest that individual speech patterns could affect the probability of airborne disease transmission. The results also provide a possible explanation for the existence of ``super spreaders'' who transmit pathogens much more readily than average and who play a key role in the spread of epidemics.
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Brebner, Chris; McCormack, Paul; Liow, Susan Rickard
2016-01-01
The phonological and morphosyntactic structures of English and Mandarin contrast maximally and an increasing number of bilinguals speak these two languages. Speech and language therapists need to understand bilingual development for children speaking these languages in order reliably to assess and provide intervention for this population. To examine the marking of verb tense in the English of two groups of bilingual pre-schoolers learning these languages in a multilingual setting where the main educational language is English. The main research question addressed was: are there differences in the rate and pattern of acquisition of verb-tense marking for English-language 1 children compared with Mandarin-language 1 children? Spoken language samples in English from 481 English-Mandarin bilingual children were elicited using a 10-item action picture test and analysed for each child's use of verb tense markers: present progressive '-ing', regular past tense '-ed', third-person singular '-s', and irregular past tense and irregular past-participle forms. For 4-6 year olds the use of inflectional markers by the different language dominance groups was compared statistically using non-parametric tests. This study provides further evidence that bilingual language development is not the same as monolingual language development. The results show that there are very different rates and patterns of verb-tense marking in English for English-language 1 and Mandarin-language 1 children. Furthermore, they show that bilingual language development in English in Singapore is not the same as monolingual language development in English, and that there are differences in development depending on language dominance. Valid and reliable assessment of bilingual children's language skills needs to consider the characteristics of all languages spoken, obtaining accurate information on language use over time and accurately establishing language dominance is essential in order to make a
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Blue-Green Colour Categorisation in Mandarin-English Speakers
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Emily Joanne Hird
2012-05-01
Full Text Available Observers are faster to detect a target among a set of distracters if the targets and distracters come from different colour categories. This cross-boundary advantage seems to be limited to the right visual field, which is consistent with the dominance of the left hemisphere for language processing. Here we study whether a similiar visual field advantage is found in Mandarin, a language which uses a logographic system. Forty late Mandarin-English bilinguals performed a blue-green colour categorisation task, in a blocked design, in their first language (L1: Mandarin or second language (L2: English. Eleven colour singletons ranging from blue to green were presented for 160ms, randomly in the left visual field (LVF or in the right visual field (RVF. We find that reaction times at the colour boundary were on average about 100 ms shorter in the LVF compared to the RVF, but only when the task was preformed in Mandarin as opposed to English. The apparent discrepancy with previous findings is conceivably due to the script nature of two languages: Mandarin logographic characters are analysed visuo-orthographically in the right fusiform gyrus [Guo and Burgund 2010, Brain Lang 115].
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Pitch structure, but not selective attention, affects accent weightings in metrical grouping.
Prince, Jon B
2014-10-01
Among other cues, pitch and temporal accents contribute to grouping in musical sequences. However, exactly how they combine remains unclear, possibly because of the role of structural organization. In 3 experiments, participants rated the perceived metrical grouping of sequences that either adhered to the rules of tonal Western musical pitch structure (musical key) or did not (atonal). The tonal status of sequences did not provide any grouping cues and was irrelevant to the task. Experiment 1 established equally strong levels of pitch leap accents and duration accents in baseline conditions, which were then recombined in subsequent experiments. Neither accent type was stronger or weaker for tonal and atonal contexts. In Experiment 2, pitch leap accents dominated over duration accents, but the extent of this advantage was greater when sequences were tonal. Experiment 3 ruled out an attentional origin of this effect by replicating this finding while explicitly manipulating attention to pitch or duration accents between participant groups. Overall, the presence of tonal pitch structure made the dimension of pitch more salient at the expense of time. These findings support a dimensional salience framework in which the presence of organizational structure prioritizes the processing of the more structured dimension regardless of task relevance, independent from psychophysical difficulty, and impervious to attentional allocation.
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What makes a rhythm complex? The influence of musical training and accent type on beat perception
Bouwer, F.L.; Burgoyne, J.A.; Odijk, D.; Honing, H.; Grahn, J.A.
2018-01-01
Perception of a regular beat in music is inferred from different types of accents. For example, increases in loudness cause intensity accents, and the grouping of time intervals in a rhythm creates temporal accents. Accents are expected to occur on the beat: when accents are “missing” on the beat,
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Working memory training to improve speech perception in noise across languages.
Ingvalson, Erin M; Dhar, Sumitrajit; Wong, Patrick C M; Liu, Hanjun
2015-06-01
Working memory capacity has been linked to performance on many higher cognitive tasks, including the ability to perceive speech in noise. Current efforts to train working memory have demonstrated that working memory performance can be improved, suggesting that working memory training may lead to improved speech perception in noise. A further advantage of working memory training to improve speech perception in noise is that working memory training materials are often simple, such as letters or digits, making them easily translatable across languages. The current effort tested the hypothesis that working memory training would be associated with improved speech perception in noise and that materials would easily translate across languages. Native Mandarin Chinese and native English speakers completed ten days of reversed digit span training. Reading span and speech perception in noise both significantly improved following training, whereas untrained controls showed no gains. These data suggest that working memory training may be used to improve listeners' speech perception in noise and that the materials may be quickly adapted to a wide variety of listeners.
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Lin, Mengxi; Francis, Alexander L
2014-11-01
Both long-term native language experience and immediate linguistic expectations can affect listeners' use of acoustic information when making a phonetic decision. In this study, a Garner selective attention task was used to investigate differences in attention to consonants and tones by American English-speaking listeners (N = 20) and Mandarin Chinese-speaking listeners hearing speech in either American English (N = 17) or Mandarin Chinese (N = 20). To minimize the effects of lexical differences and differences in the linguistic status of pitch across the two languages, stimuli and response conditions were selected such that all tokens constitute legitimate words in both languages and all responses required listeners to make decisions that were linguistically meaningful in their native language. Results showed that regardless of ambient language, Chinese listeners processed consonant and tone in a combined manner, consistent with previous research. In contrast, English listeners treated tones and consonants as perceptually separable. Results are discussed in terms of the role of sub-phonemic differences in acoustic cues across language, and the linguistic status of consonants and pitch contours in the two languages.
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Vicky T. Lai
2013-04-01
Full Text Available In this paper we examine whether experience with spatial metaphors for time has an influence on people’s representation of time. In particular we ask whether spatiotemporal metaphors can have both chronic and immediate effects on temporal thinking. In Study 1, we examine the prevalence of ego-moving representations for time in Mandarin speakers, English speakers, and Mandarin-English (ME bilinguals. As predicted by observations in linguistic analyses, we find that Mandarin speakers are less likely to take an ego-moving perspective than are English speakers. Further, we find that ME bilinguals tested in English are less likely to take an ego-moving perspective than are English monolinguals (an effect of L1 on meaning-making in L2, and also that ME bilinguals tested in Mandarin are more likely to take an ego-moving perspective than are Mandarin monolinguals (an effect of L2 on meaning-making in L1. These findings demonstrate that habits of metaphor use in one language can influence temporal reasoning in another language, suggesting the metaphors can have a chronic effect on patterns in thought. In Study 2 we test Mandarin speakers using either horizontal or vertical metaphors in the immediate context of the task. We find that Mandarin speakers are more likely to construct front-back representations of time when understanding front-back metaphors, and more likely to construct up-down representations of time when understanding up-down metaphors. These findings demonstrate that spatiotemporal metaphors can also have an immediate influence on temporal reasoning. Taken together, these findings demonstrate that the metaphors we use to talk about time have both immediate and long-term consequences for how we conceptualize and reason about this fundamental domain of experience.
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Narrative skills in two languages of Mandarin-English bilingual children.
Hao, Ying; Bedore, Lisa M; Sheng, Li; Peña, Elizabeth D
2018-03-08
Narrative skills between Mandarin and English in Mandarin-English (ME) bilingual children were compared, exploring cross-linguistic interactions of these skills, and influences of age and current language experience (input and output) on narrative performance. Macrostructure and microstructure in elicited narratives from 21 ME bilingual children were analysed. Language experience was collected by parent report and entered as a covariate. Repeated measures analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) was conducted to compare the two languages. Children demonstrated better narrative performance in English than Mandarin, with a larger cross-linguistic difference in microstructure than macrostructure. Significant cross-linguistic correlations were only found in children with high Mandarin vocabulary. Age, associated with length of English exposure, only significantly correlated with narrative performance in English. Output had stronger correlations with narrative skills than input. Macrostructure may be less variable across languages than microstructure. Children may need to reach a threshold of vocabulary for cross-linguistic interactions of narrative skills to occur. The effect of age in English may be related to increased cumulative English experience. Children may experience a plateau in Mandarin due to insufficient Mandarin exposure. Stronger correlations between output and narrative skills may be attributed to the expressive nature of both.
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A Narrative Evaluation of Mandarin-Speaking Children With Language Impairment.
Hao, Ying; Sheng, Li; Zhang, Yiwen; Jiang, Fan; de Villiers, Jill; Lee, Wendy; Liu, Xueman Lucy
2018-02-15
We aimed to study narrative skills in Mandarin-speaking children with language impairment (LI) to compare with children with LI speaking Indo-European languages. Eighteen Mandarin-speaking children with LI (mean age 6;2 [years;months]) and 18 typically developing (TD) age controls told 3 stories elicited using the Mandarin Expressive Narrative Test (de Villiers & Liu, 2014). We compared macrostructure-evaluating descriptions of characters, settings, initiating events, internal responses,plans, actions, and consequences. We also studied general microstructure, including productivity, lexical diversity, syntactic complexity, and grammaticality. In addition, we compared the use of 6 fine-grained microstructure elements that evaluate particular Mandarin linguistic features. Children with LI exhibited weaknesses in 5 macrostructure elements, lexical diversity, syntactic complexity, and 3 Mandarin-specific, fine-grained microstructure elements. Children with LI and TD controls demonstrated comparable performance on 2 macrostructure elements, productivity, grammaticality, and the remaining 3 fine-grained microstructure features. Similarities and differences are noted in narrative profiles of children with LI who speak Mandarin versus those who speak Indo-European languages. The results are consistent with the view that profiles of linguistic deficits are shaped by the ambient language. Clinical implications are discussed.
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Utterance-final particles in Taiwan Mandarin : contact, context and core functions
Lin, Chin-hui
2014-01-01
The use of utterance-final particles (UFPs) is a salient feature of Taiwan Mandarin, a Mandarin variety spoken in Taiwan. Despite their widespread use, Taiwan Mandarin UFPs have not attracted much attention in previous research. One reason for this neglect is that previous studies focus on UFPs that
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Speech-language pathologists' assessment and intervention practices with multilingual children.
Williams, Corinne J; McLeod, Sharynne
2012-06-01
Within predominantly English-speaking countries such as the US, UK, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia, there are a significant number of people who speak languages other than English. This study aimed to examine Australian speech-language pathologists' (SLPs) perspectives and experiences of multilingualism, including their assessment and intervention practices, and service delivery methods when working with children who speak languages other than English. A questionnaire was completed by 128 SLPs who attended an SLP seminar about cultural and linguistic diversity. Approximately one half of the SLPs (48.4%) reported that they had at least minimal competence in a language(s) other than English; but only 12 (9.4%) reported that they were proficient in another language. The SLPs spoke a total of 28 languages other than English, the most common being French, Italian, German, Spanish, Mandarin, and Auslan (Australian sign language). Participants reported that they had, in the past 12 months, worked with a mean of 59.2 (range 1-100) children from multilingual backgrounds. These children were reported to speak between two and five languages each; the most common being: Vietnamese, Arabic, Cantonese, Mandarin, Australian Indigenous languages, Tagalog, Greek, and other Chinese languages. There was limited overlap between the languages spoken by the SLPs and the children on the SLPs' caseloads. Many of the SLPs assessed children's speech (50.5%) and/or language (34.2%) without assistance from others (including interpreters). English was the primary language used during assessments and intervention. The majority of SLPs always used informal speech (76.7%) and language (78.2%) assessments and, if standardized tests were used, typically they were in English. The SLPs sought additional information about the children's languages and cultural backgrounds, but indicated that they had limited resources to discriminate between speech and language difference vs disorder.
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Automaticity and stability of adaptation to a foreign-accented speaker
Witteman, M.J.; Bardhan, N.P.; Weber, A.C.; McQueen, J.M.
2015-01-01
In three cross-modal priming experiments we asked whether adaptation to a foreign-accented speaker is automatic, and whether adaptation can be seen after a long delay between initial exposure and test. Dutch listeners were exposed to a Hebrew-accented Dutch speaker with two types of Dutch words:
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A Short Note on Accent-Bias, Social Identity and Ethnocentrism
Chakraborty, Rahul
2017-01-01
This paper discusses the interrelations among accent-based biases, social identity and ethnocentrism. Construction of social identity creates a set of ethnocentric values within a person, which indirectly or directly plays a pivotal role in generating accent related biases. Starting with Tajfel's (1959) social identity theory and then the…
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Kesalahan Penggunaan Kata Bantu Bilangan Bahasa Mandarin pada Siswa Indonesia Tingkat Prapemula
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Ayu Trihardini
2015-05-01
Full Text Available The purpose of this study was to analyze Indonesian breakthrough level students’ errors in using Mandarin measure words. The collected data were the errors made by students of Prodi Pendidikan Bahasa Mandarin UNJ who attend Conversation II course (CEFR A1/breakthrough on written and oral utterance. This study used Zhou Xiaobin’s research design in Mandarin measure words error analysis, with the Carl James model of identification errors. The result of this study shows Indonesian students’ errors in using Mandarin measure words can be determined as follows: omission, misselection, misordering, and blends. Furthermore, this study proves that there are systematic errors made by students with different mother tongue and at the same level of learning Mandarin. The research results can be used to develop Mandarin measure words teaching techniques based on error analysis.
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Categorical Perception of Lexical Tones in Mandarin-speaking Congenital Amusics
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Wan Ting Huang
2015-06-01
Full Text Available Previous research suggests that within Mandarin-speaking congenital amusics, only a subgroup has behavioral lexical tone perception impairments (tone agnosia, whereas the rest of amusics do not. The purpose of the current study was to investigate the categorical nature of lexical tone perception in Mandarin-speaking amusics with and without behavioral lexical tone deficits. Three groups of listeners (controls, pure amusics and amusics with tone agnosia participated in tone identification and discrimination tasks. Indexes of the categorical perception of a physical continuum of fundamental frequencies ranging from a rising to level tone were measured. Specifically, the stimulus durations were manipulated at 100 and 200 ms. For both stimulus durations, all groups exhibited similar categorical boundaries. The pure amusics showed sharp identification slopes and significantly peaked discrimination functions similar to those of normal controls. However, such essential characteristics for the categorical perception of lexical tones were not observed in amusics with tone agnosia. An enlarged step-size from 20 Hz to 35 Hz was not able to produce any discrimination peaks in tone agnosics either. The current study revealed that only amusics with tone agnosia showed a lack of categorical tone perception, while the pure amusics demonstrated typical categorical perception of lexical tones, indicating that the deficit of pitch processing in music does not necessarily result in the deficit in the categorical perception of lexical tones. The different performance between congenital amusics with and without tone agnosia provides a new perspective on the proposition of the relationship between music and speech perception.
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Susanne Maria Reiterer
2011-10-01
Full Text Available An unanswered question in adult language learning or late bi- and multilingualism is why individuals show marked differences in their ability to imitate foreign accents. While recent research acknowledges that more adults than previously assumed can still acquire a native foreign accent, very little is known about the neuro-cognitive correlates of this special ability. We investigated 140 German speaking individuals displaying varying degrees of mimicking capacity, based on natural language text, sentence and word imitations either in their second language English or in Hindi and Tamil, languages they had never been exposed to. The large subject pool was extensively controlled for previous language experience prior to magnetic resonance imaging (MRI. The late-onset (around 10 years bilinguals showed significant individual differences as to how they employed their left-hemisphere speech areas: higher hemodynamic activation in a distinct fronto-parietal network accompanied low ability, while high ability paralleled enhanced gray matter volume in these areas concomitant with decreased hemodynamic responses. Finally and unexpectedly, males were found to be more talented foreign speech mimics.
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Chan, Jim Y. H.
2016-01-01
The study reported in this article examined Hong Kong students' attitudes towards English accents from three interrelated perspectives: (1) their awareness of accents, (2) their perception of accents in relation to the dimensions of status and solidarity, and (3) their choice of accents in various local language-using contexts. By means of the…
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Question Word in the Mandarin Language
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Xu Yunyu
2016-12-01
Full Text Available In an interrogative sentence in Mandarin language, a question word can be placed in the beginning, middle or end of a sentence. Because of the different nation and culture, when a foreign student learns Mandarin, they find it difficult to understand the question words and the position of the question words in that language. Because of that, the writer proposes to explain such problems. This research aims to find out what are the types of question words in Mandarin, and also to explain the function and usage of question words in the Mandarin interrogative sentence. An interrogative sentence is a very important sentence. In Mandarin, the following question words: 谁(shuí “Who”，在哪里(zài nǎli “where”, 在哪儿(zài nǎ’er “where”，为什么(wèi shénme “why”, 怎么(zěnme “why”，多少（duō shǎo） “how many”，多久(duō jiǔ “how long”，什么时候 (shénme shíhòu “when”，什么(shénme “what”，做什么(zuò shénme “why”，干 什么(gàn shénme “why”，干嘛(gànma “why” and so on are used to ask “who”, “where”, “what”, “how much”, “when”, “what time”, and “why”. Those words have different functions and usage. Each sentence has a certain structure and word order. A question word can be placed in the beginning, middle, or end of a sentence. When the place is changed, there is a possibility of miscommunication. DOI: https://doi.org/10.24071/llt.2013.160106
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Differentiation between Flavors of Sweet Orange (Citrus sinensis) and Mandarin (Citrus reticulata).
Feng, Shi; Suh, Joon Hyuk; Gmitter, Frederick G; Wang, Yu
2018-01-10
Pioneering investigations referring to citrus flavor have been intensively conducted. However, the characteristic flavor difference between sweet orange and mandarin has not been defined. In this study, sensory analysis illustrated the crucial role of aroma in the differentiation between orange flavor and mandarin flavor. To study aroma, Valencia orange and LB8-9 mandarin were used. Their most aroma-active compounds were preliminarily identified by aroma extract dilution analysis (AEDA). Quantitation of key volatiles followed by calculation of odor activity values (OAVs) further detected potent components (OAV ≥ 1) impacting the overall aromatic profile of orange/mandarin. Follow-up aroma profile analysis revealed that ethyl butanoate, ethyl 2-methylbutanoate, octanal, decanal, and acetaldehyde were essential for orange-like aroma, whereas linalool, octanal, α-pinene, limonene, and (E,E)-2,4-decadienal were considered key components for mandarin-like aroma. Furthermore, an unreleased mandarin hybrid producing fruit with orange-like flavor was used to validate the identification of characteristic volatiles in orange-like aroma.
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Performance of 'Okitsu' Satsuma Mandarin on nine rootstocks
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Zuleide Hissano Tazima
2013-12-01
Full Text Available Mandarins have become increasingly valued as citrus fruits for the fresh market due to the easy peeling, attractive flavor, and health and nutritional properties. Plant growth and yield, and characteristics of fruits of 'Okitsu' Satsuma mandarin (Citrus unshiu Marc. trees grafted on nine rootstocks were evaluated in Londrina, northern Paraná, Brazil. The rootstocks were: 'Rangpur' lime (Citrus limonia Osb.; 'Cleopatra' (Citrus reshni hort. ex Tanaka and 'Sunki' mandarins (Citrus sunki hort. ex Tanaka; 'C-13' [Citrus sinensis × Poncirus trifoliata (L. Raf.] and 'Carrizo' citranges [C. sinensis × P. trifoliata (L. Raf.]; 'Volkamer' lemon (Citrus volkameriana V. Ten. & Pasq.; trifoliate orange [P. trifoliata (L. Raf.; 'Caipira DAC' sweet orange [C. sinensis (L. Osb.] and 'Swingle' citrumelo [Citrus paradisi Macfad. cv. Duncan × P. trifoliata (L. Raf.]. The highest plant growth was for the trees on 'Cleopatra' mandarin and 'Caipira DAC' sweet orange. In contrast, the smallest size was for the trees on 'Volkamer' lemon and trifoliate orange. The largest difference between the trunk diameter below and above the grafting point was induced by 'Swingle' citrumelo. Trees of 'Okitsu' Satsuma mandarin on 'Swingle' citrumelo presented the highest yield, while 'C-13', 'Carrizo', 'Sunki', and 'Swingle' induced the largest fruit masses. With regard to fruit characteristics, 'Carrizo' and trifoliate orange induced the best ratio and juice content. Based on theoretical values, 'Rangpur' lime and 'Volkamer' lemon induced the lowest yields
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Quam, Carolyn; Creel, Sarah C
2017-01-01
Previous research has mainly considered the impact of tone-language experience on ability to discriminate linguistic pitch, but proficient bilingual listening requires differential processing of sound variation in each language context. Here, we ask whether Mandarin-English bilinguals, for whom pitch indicates word distinctions in one language but not the other, can process pitch differently in a Mandarin context vs. an English context. Across three eye-tracked word-learning experiments, results indicated that tone-intonation bilinguals process tone in accordance with the language context. In Experiment 1, 51 Mandarin-English bilinguals and 26 English speakers without tone experience were taught Mandarin-compatible novel words with tones. Mandarin-English bilinguals out-performed English speakers, and, for bilinguals, overall accuracy was correlated with Mandarin dominance. Experiment 2 taught 24 Mandarin-English bilinguals and 25 English speakers novel words with Mandarin-like tones, but English-like phonemes and phonotactics. The Mandarin-dominance advantages observed in Experiment 1 disappeared when words were English-like. Experiment 3 contrasted Mandarin-like vs. English-like words in a within-subjects design, providing even stronger evidence that bilinguals can process tone language-specifically. Bilinguals (N = 58), regardless of language dominance, attended more to tone than English speakers without Mandarin experience (N = 28), but only when words were Mandarin-like-not when they were English-like. Mandarin-English bilinguals thus tailor tone processing to the within-word language context.
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Characterisation of cell-wall polysaccharides from mandarin segment membranes
Coll-Almela, L.; Saura-Lopez, D.; Laencina-Sanchez, J.; Schols, H.A.; Voragen, A.G.J.; Ros-García, J.M.
2015-01-01
In an attempt to develop a process of enzymatic peeling of mandarin segments suitable for use on an industrial scale, the cell wall fraction of the segment membrane of Satsuma mandarin fruits was extracted to obtain a chelating agent-soluble pectin fraction (ChSS), a dilute sodium hydroxide-soluble
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Liu, Chang; Azimi, Behnam; Bhandary, Moulesh; Hu, Yi
2014-01-01
The goal of this study was to investigate Mandarin Chinese tone identification in quiet and multi-talker babble conditions for normal-hearing listeners. Tone identification was measured with speech stimuli and stimuli with low and/or high harmonics that were embedded in three Mandarin vowels with two fundamental frequencies. There were six types of stimuli: all harmonics (All), low harmonics (Low), high harmonics (High), and the first (H1), second (H2), and third (H3) harmonic. Results showed that, for quiet conditions, individual harmonics carried frequency contour information well enough for tone identification with high accuracy; however, in noisy conditions, tone identification with individual low harmonics (e.g., H1, H2, and H3) was significantly lower than that with the Low, High, and All harmonics. Moreover, tone identification with individual harmonics in noise was lower for a low F0 than for a high F0, and was also dependent on vowel category. Tone identification with individual low-frequency harmonics was accounted for by local signal-to-noise ratios, indicating that audibility of harmonics in noise may play a primary role in tone identification.
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Quam, Carolyn; Creel, Sarah C.
2017-01-01
Previous research has mainly considered the impact of tone-language experience on ability to discriminate linguistic pitch, but proficient bilingual listening requires differential processing of sound variation in each language context. Here, we ask whether Mandarin-English bilinguals, for whom pitch indicates word distinctions in one language but not the other, can process pitch differently in a Mandarin context vs. an English context. Across three eye-tracked word-learning experiments, results indicated that tone-intonation bilinguals process tone in accordance with the language context. In Experiment 1, 51 Mandarin-English bilinguals and 26 English speakers without tone experience were taught Mandarin-compatible novel words with tones. Mandarin-English bilinguals out-performed English speakers, and, for bilinguals, overall accuracy was correlated with Mandarin dominance. Experiment 2 taught 24 Mandarin-English bilinguals and 25 English speakers novel words with Mandarin-like tones, but English-like phonemes and phonotactics. The Mandarin-dominance advantages observed in Experiment 1 disappeared when words were English-like. Experiment 3 contrasted Mandarin-like vs. English-like words in a within-subjects design, providing even stronger evidence that bilinguals can process tone language-specifically. Bilinguals (N = 58), regardless of language dominance, attended more to tone than English speakers without Mandarin experience (N = 28), but only when words were Mandarin-like—not when they were English-like. Mandarin-English bilinguals thus tailor tone processing to the within-word language context. PMID:28076400
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WANG, FRED FANGYU
IN RESPONSE TO THE NEEDS OF THE GROWING NUMBER OF AMERICAN HIGH SCHOOL AND COLLEGE STUDENTS LEARNING CHINESE, SETON HALL UNIVERSITY UNDERTOOK A CONTRACT WITH THE U.S. OFFICE OF EDUCATION TO COMPILE A BILINGUAL POCKET-SIZE DICTIONARY FOR BEGINNING STUDENTS OF SPOKEN MANDARIN CHINESE. THE PRESENT WORK IS THE CHINESE TO ENGLISH SECTION IN PRELIMINARY…
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Ping, Lichuan; Wang, Ningyuan; Tang, Guofang; Lu, Thomas; Yin, Li; Tu, Wenhe; Fu, Qian-Jie
2017-09-01
Because of limited spectral resolution, Mandarin-speaking cochlear implant (CI) users have difficulty perceiving fundamental frequency (F0) cues that are important to lexical tone recognition. To improve Mandarin tone recognition in CI users, we implemented and evaluated a novel real-time algorithm (C-tone) to enhance the amplitude contour, which is strongly correlated with the F0 contour. The C-tone algorithm was implemented in clinical processors and evaluated in eight users of the Nurotron NSP-60 CI system. Subjects were given 2 weeks of experience with C-tone. Recognition of Chinese tones, monosyllables, and disyllables in quiet was measured with and without the C-tone algorithm. Subjective quality ratings were also obtained for C-tone. After 2 weeks of experience with C-tone, there were small but significant improvements in recognition of lexical tones, monosyllables, and disyllables (P C-tone were greater for disyllables than for monosyllables. Subjective quality ratings showed no strong preference for or against C-tone, except for perception of own voice, where C-tone was preferred. The real-time C-tone algorithm provided small but significant improvements for speech performance in quiet with no change in sound quality. Pre-processing algorithms to reduce noise and better real-time F0 extraction would improve the benefits of C-tone in complex listening environments. Chinese CI users' speech recognition in quiet can be significantly improved by modifying the amplitude contour to better resemble the F0 contour.
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Malaysian Chinese Speakers' Attitudes Towards Foochow, Hokkien and Mandarin
Puah, Yann-Yann; Ting, Su-Hie
2015-01-01
The study examines the influence of gender, age and socio-economic status on attitudes of Foochow and Hokkien towards their ethnic language and Mandarin. The matched guise test results of 120 Foochow and 120 Hokkien participants in Kuching, Malaysia, showed positive attitudes towards Mandarin on all the 15 traits. The Hokkien participants were…
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Yu, Yuan; Bai, Jinhe; Chen, Chunxian; Plotto, Anne; Baldwin, Elizabeth A; Gmitter, Frederick G
2018-02-01
Citrus fruit flavor is an important attribute prioritized in variety improvement. The present study compared juice volatiles compositions from 13 selected citrus genotypes, including six mandarins (Citrus reticulata), three sour oranges (Citrus aurantium), one blood orange (Citrus sinensis), one lime (Citrus limonia), one Clementine (Citrus clementina) and one satsuma (Citrus unshiu). Large differences were observed with respect to volatile compositions among the citrus genotypes. 'Goutou' sour orange contained the greatest number of volatile compounds and the largest volatile production level. 'Ponkan' mandarin had the smallest number of volatiles and 'Owari' satsuma yielded the lowest volatile production level. 'Goutou' sour orange and 'Moro' blood orange were clearly distinguished from other citrus genotypes based on the analysis of volatile compositions, even though they were assigned into one single group with two other sour oranges by the molecular marker profiles. The clustering analysis based on the aroma volatile compositions was able to differentiate mandarin varieties and natural sub-groups, and was also supported by the molecular marker study. The gas chromatography-mass spectrometry analysis of citrus juice aroma volatiles can be used as a tool to distinguish citrus genotypes and assist in the assessment of future citrus breeding programs. The aroma volatile profiles of the different citrus genotypes and inter-relationships detected among volatile compounds and among citrus genotypes will provide fundamental information on the development of marker-assisted selection in citrus breeding. © 2017 Society of Chemical Industry. © 2017 Society of Chemical Industry.
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Musical experience and Mandarin tone discrimination and imitation
Gottfried, Terry L.; Staby, Ann M.; Ziemer, Christine J.
2004-05-01
Previous work [T. L. Gottfried and D. Riester, J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 108, 2604 (2000)] showed that native speakers of American English with musical training performed better than nonmusicians when identifying the four distinctive tones of Mandarin Chinese (high-level, mid-rising, low-dipping, high-falling). Accuracy for both groups was relatively low since listeners were not trained on the phonemic contrasts. Current research compares musicians and nonmusicians on discrimination and imitation of unfamiliar tones. Listeners were presented with two different Mandarin words that had either the same or different tones; listeners indicated whether the tones were same or different. Thus, they were required to determine a categorical match (same or different tone), rather than an auditory match. All listeners had significantly more difficulty discriminating between mid-rising and low-dipping tones than with other contrasts. Listeners with more musical training showed significantly greater accuracy in their discrimination. Likewise, musicians' spoken imitations of Mandarin tones (model tokens presented by a native speaker) were rated as significantly more native-like than those of nonmusicians. These findings suggest that musicians may have abilities or training that facilitate their perception and production of Mandarin tones. However, further research is needed to determine whether this advantage transfers to language learning situations.
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Soli, Sigfrid D; Zheng, Yun; Meng, Zhaoli; Li, Gang
2012-09-01
The purpose of this study was to develop a practical mean for clinical evaluation of early pediatric language development by establishing developmental trajectories for receptive and expressive vocabulary growth in children between 6 and 32 months of age using a simple, time-efficient assessment tool. Simplified short form versions of the Words and Gestures and Words and Sentences vocabulary inventories in the Mandarin Communicative Development Inventory [1] were developed and used to assess early language development in developmentally normal children from 6 to 32 months of age during routine health checks. Developmental trajectories characterizing the rate of receptive and expressive vocabulary growth between 6 and 32 months of age are reported. These trajectories allow the equivalent age corresponding to a score to be determined after a brief structured interview with the child's parents that can be conducted in a busy clinical setting. The simplified short forms of the Mandarin Communicative Development Inventories can serve as a clinically useful tool to assess early child language development, providing a practical mean of objectively assessing early language development following early interventions to treat young children with hearing impairment as well as speech and language delays. Objective evidence of language development is essential for achievement of effective (re)habilitation outcomes. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.
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Chen, Zhaocong; Wong, Francis C K; Jones, Jeffery A; Li, Weifeng; Liu, Peng; Chen, Xi; Liu, Hanjun
2015-08-17
Speech perception and production are intimately linked. There is evidence that speech motor learning results in changes to auditory processing of speech. Whether speech motor control benefits from perceptual learning in speech, however, remains unclear. This event-related potential study investigated whether speech-sound learning can modulate the processing of feedback errors during vocal pitch regulation. Mandarin speakers were trained to perceive five Thai lexical tones while learning to associate pictures with spoken words over 5 days. Before and after training, participants produced sustained vowel sounds while they heard their vocal pitch feedback unexpectedly perturbed. As compared to the pre-training session, the magnitude of vocal compensation significantly decreased for the control group, but remained consistent for the trained group at the post-training session. However, the trained group had smaller and faster N1 responses to pitch perturbations and exhibited enhanced P2 responses that correlated significantly with their learning performance. These findings indicate that the cortical processing of vocal pitch regulation can be shaped by learning new speech-sound associations, suggesting that perceptual learning in speech can produce transfer effects to facilitating the neural mechanisms underlying the online monitoring of auditory feedback regarding vocal production.
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Health Information in Chinese, Simplified (Mandarin dialect) (简体中文)
... Mandarin dialect)) MP4 Healthy Roads Media Postpartum Depression Emotional Changes After Giving Birth - 简体中文 (Chinese, Simplified (Mandarin ... PDF Vermont Department of Health Women's Health Non-Contraceptive Indications for Hormonal Contraceptive Products - English PDF Non- ...
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A lighting metric for quantitative evaluation of accent lighting systems
Acholo, Cyril O.; Connor, Kenneth A.; Radke, Richard J.
2014-09-01
Accent lighting is critical for artwork and sculpture lighting in museums, and subject lighting for stage, Film and television. The research problem of designing effective lighting in such settings has been revived recently with the rise of light-emitting-diode-based solid state lighting. In this work, we propose an easy-to-apply quantitative measure of the scene's visual quality as perceived by human viewers. We consider a well-accent-lit scene as one which maximizes the information about the scene (in an information-theoretic sense) available to the user. We propose a metric based on the entropy of the distribution of colors, which are extracted from an image of the scene from the viewer's perspective. We demonstrate that optimizing the metric as a function of illumination configuration (i.e., position, orientation, and spectral composition) results in natural, pleasing accent lighting. We use a photorealistic simulation tool to validate the functionality of our proposed approach, showing its successful application to two- and three-dimensional scenes.
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Resourcing speech-language pathologists to work with multilingual children.
McLeod, Sharynne
2014-06-01
Speech-language pathologists play important roles in supporting people to be competent communicators in the languages of their communities. However, with over 7000 languages spoken throughout the world and the majority of the global population being multilingual, there is often a mismatch between the languages spoken by children and families and their speech-language pathologists. This paper provides insights into service provision for multilingual children within an English-dominant country by viewing Australia's multilingual population as a microcosm of ethnolinguistic minorities. Recent population studies of Australian pre-school children show that their most common languages other than English are: Arabic, Cantonese, Vietnamese, Italian, Mandarin, Spanish, and Greek. Although 20.2% of services by Speech Pathology Australia members are offered in languages other than English, there is a mismatch between the language of the services and the languages of children within similar geographical communities. Australian speech-language pathologists typically use informal or English-based assessments and intervention tools with multilingual children. Thus, there is a need for accessible culturally and linguistically appropriate resources for working with multilingual children. Recent international collaborations have resulted in practical strategies to support speech-language pathologists during assessment, intervention, and collaboration with families, communities, and other professionals. The International Expert Panel on Multilingual Children's Speech was assembled to prepare a position paper to address issues faced by speech-language pathologists when working with multilingual populations. The Multilingual Children's Speech website ( http://www.csu.edu.au/research/multilingual-speech ) addresses one of the aims of the position paper by providing free resources and information for speech-language pathologists about more than 45 languages. These international
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Is the superior verbal memory span of Mandarin speakers due to faster rehearsal?
Mattys, Sven L; Baddeley, Alan; Trenkic, Danijela
2018-04-01
It is well established that digit span in native Chinese speakers is atypically high. This is commonly attributed to a capacity for more rapid subvocal rehearsal for that group. We explored this hypothesis by testing a group of English-speaking native Mandarin speakers on digit span and word span in both Mandarin and English, together with a measure of speed of articulation for each. When compared to the performance of native English speakers, the Mandarin group proved to be superior on both digit and word spans while predictably having lower spans in English. This suggests that the Mandarin advantage is not limited to digits. Speed of rehearsal correlated with span performance across materials. However, this correlation was more pronounced for English speakers than for any of the Chinese measures. Further analysis suggested that speed of rehearsal did not provide an adequate account of differences between Mandarin and English spans or for the advantage of digits over words. Possible alternative explanations are discussed.
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Quality of Canned mandarin as affected by preservation liquid
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Antonio Jose Perez-Lopez
2010-12-01
Full Text Available This study is integrated within a research line dedicated to evaluate different options to introduce mandarin in Spanish agro-food industries and in both national and international markets. The effects of different preservation liquids (sucrose solution, sucrose and ascorbic acid solution, grape, and grapefruit juices, soluble solids (10, 12, 14 ºBrix, and thermal processing (30 seconds at 98 ºC on vitamin C, color, carotenoids and sensory quality of canned Satsuma mandarin segments were studied. The liquid preservation that presented the best results was grapefruit juice, which provided the highest vitamin C (323 mg.L-1 and total carotenoids (16.4 mg.L-1 contents (the main carotenoid found was β-cryptoxanthin, intense orange color, high thermal stability, and very good sensory quality (e.g. intense floral and fresh-mandarin aromas and low levels of off-flavors.
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Eyes and ears: Using eye tracking and pupillometry to understand challenges to speech recognition.
Van Engen, Kristin J; McLaughlin, Drew J
2018-05-04
Although human speech recognition is often experienced as relatively effortless, a number of common challenges can render the task more difficult. Such challenges may originate in talkers (e.g., unfamiliar accents, varying speech styles), the environment (e.g. noise), or in listeners themselves (e.g., hearing loss, aging, different native language backgrounds). Each of these challenges can reduce the intelligibility of spoken language, but even when intelligibility remains high, they can place greater processing demands on listeners. Noisy conditions, for example, can lead to poorer recall for speech, even when it has been correctly understood. Speech intelligibility measures, memory tasks, and subjective reports of listener difficulty all provide critical information about the effects of such challenges on speech recognition. Eye tracking and pupillometry complement these methods by providing objective physiological measures of online cognitive processing during listening. Eye tracking records the moment-to-moment direction of listeners' visual attention, which is closely time-locked to unfolding speech signals, and pupillometry measures the moment-to-moment size of listeners' pupils, which dilate in response to increased cognitive load. In this paper, we review the uses of these two methods for studying challenges to speech recognition. Copyright © 2018. Published by Elsevier B.V.
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Akomolafe, Soji
2013-01-01
Of some of the major types of discrimination, the one that gets the least attention is national origin discrimination and in particular, accent discrimination, especially when it comes to upward mobility in the workplace. Yet, unlike other forms of discrimination, accent discrimination is rarely a subject of any robust public debate. This paper is a modest attempt to help establish a framework for understanding the relative neglect to which the discourse on accent discrimination has been subjected vis-a-vis the overall national debate on diversity. Hopefully, in the process, it will stimulate a more robust conversation on the plight of foreign-accented speakers.
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From One to Multiple Accents on a Test of L2 Listening Comprehension
Ockey, Gary J.; French, Robert
2016-01-01
Concerns about the need for assessing multidialectal listening skills for global contexts are becoming increasingly prevalent. However, the inclusion of multiple accents on listening assessments may threaten test fairness because it is not practical to include every accent that may be encountered in the language use domain on these tests. Given…
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Gordon-Salant, Sandra; Yeni-Komshian, Grace H.; Pickett, Erin J.; Fitzgibbons, Peter J.
2016-01-01
This study examined the ability of older and younger listeners to perceive contrastive syllable stress in unaccented and Spanish-accented cognate bi-syllabic English words. Younger listeners with normal hearing, older listeners with normal hearing, and older listeners with hearing impairment judged recordings of words that contrasted in stress that conveyed a noun or verb form (e.g., CONduct/conDUCT), using two paradigms differing in the amount of semantic support. The stimuli were spoken by four speakers: one native English speaker and three Spanish-accented speakers (one moderately and two mildly accented). The results indicate that all listeners showed the lowest accuracy scores in responding to the most heavily accented speaker and the highest accuracy in judging the productions of the native English speaker. The two older groups showed lower accuracy in judging contrastive lexical stress than the younger group, especially for verbs produced by the most accented speaker. This general pattern of performance was observed in the two experimental paradigms, although performance was generally lower in the paradigm without semantic support. The findings suggest that age-related difficulty in adjusting to deviations in contrastive bi-syllabic lexical stress produced with a Spanish accent may be an important factor limiting perception of accented English by older people. PMID:27036250
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Fossard Marion
2007-01-01
Full Text Available Abstract Background Foreign accent syndrome (FAS is a rare speech disorder characterized by the appearance of a new accent, different from the speaker's native language and perceived as foreign by the speaker and the listener. In most of the reported cases, FAS follows stroke but has also been found following traumatic brain injury, cerebral haemorrhage and multiple sclerosis. In very few cases, FAS was reported in patients presenting with psychiatric disorders but the link between this condition and FAS was confirmed in only one case. Case presentation In this report, we present the case of FG, a bipolar patient presenting with language disorders characterized by a foreign accent and agrammatism, initially categorized as being of psychogenic origin. The patient had an extensive neuropsychological and language evaluation as well as brain imaging exams. In addition to FAS and agrammatism, FG also showed a working memory deficit and executive dysfunction. Moreover, these clinical signs were related to altered cerebral activity on an FDG-PET scan that showed diffuse hypometabolism in the frontal, parietal and temporal lobes bilaterally as well as a focal deficit in the area of the anterior left temporal lobe. When compared to the MRI, these deficits were related to asymmetric atrophy, which was retrospectively seen in the left temporal and frontal opercular/insular region without a focal lesion. Discussion To our knowledge, FG is the first case of FAS imaged with an 18F-FDG-PET scan. The nature and type of neuropsychological and linguistic deficits, supported by neuroimaging data, exclude a neurotoxic or neurodegenerative origin for this patient's clinical manifestations. For similar reasons, a psychogenic etiology is also highly improbable. Conclusion To account for the FAS and agrammatism in FG, various explanations have been ruled out. Because of the focal deficit seen on the brain imaging, involving the left insular and anterior temporal cortex
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Poulin, Stéphane; Macoir, Joël; Paquet, Nancy; Fossard, Marion; Gagnon, Louis
2007-01-04
Foreign accent syndrome (FAS) is a rare speech disorder characterized by the appearance of a new accent, different from the speaker's native language and perceived as foreign by the speaker and the listener. In most of the reported cases, FAS follows stroke but has also been found following traumatic brain injury, cerebral haemorrhage and multiple sclerosis. In very few cases, FAS was reported in patients presenting with psychiatric disorders but the link between this condition and FAS was confirmed in only one case. In this report, we present the case of FG, a bipolar patient presenting with language disorders characterized by a foreign accent and agrammatism, initially categorized as being of psychogenic origin. The patient had an extensive neuropsychological and language evaluation as well as brain imaging exams. In addition to FAS and agrammatism, FG also showed a working memory deficit and executive dysfunction. Moreover, these clinical signs were related to altered cerebral activity on an FDG-PET scan that showed diffuse hypometabolism in the frontal, parietal and temporal lobes bilaterally as well as a focal deficit in the area of the anterior left temporal lobe. When compared to the MRI, these deficits were related to asymmetric atrophy, which was retrospectively seen in the left temporal and frontal opercular/insular region without a focal lesion. To our knowledge, FG is the first case of FAS imaged with an 18F-FDG-PET scan. The nature and type of neuropsychological and linguistic deficits, supported by neuroimaging data, exclude a neurotoxic or neurodegenerative origin for this patient's clinical manifestations. For similar reasons, a psychogenic etiology is also highly improbable. To account for the FAS and agrammatism in FG, various explanations have been ruled out. Because of the focal deficit seen on the brain imaging, involving the left insular and anterior temporal cortex, two brain regions frequently involved in aphasic syndrome but also in FAS, a
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Learning to Express Gratitude in Mandarin Chinese through Web-Based Instruction
Yang, Li
2016-01-01
This study explored the effectiveness of a self-access website as a tool to teach expressions of gratitude to learners of Mandarin Chinese. The web-based instruction included explicit instruction on how to express gratitude appropriately in Mandarin and various consciousness-raising exercises/activities. Two groups of learners who differed in…
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Listening to a non-native speaker: Adaptation and generalization
Clarke, Constance M.
2004-05-01
Non-native speech can cause perceptual difficulty for the native listener, but experience can moderate this difficulty. This study explored the perceptual benefit of a brief (approximately 1 min) exposure to foreign-accented speech using a cross-modal word matching paradigm. Processing speed was tracked by recording reaction times (RTs) to visual probe words following English sentences produced by a Spanish-accented speaker. In experiment 1, RTs decreased significantly over 16 accented utterances and by the end were equal to RTs to a native voice. In experiment 2, adaptation to one Spanish-accented voice improved perceptual efficiency for a new Spanish-accented voice, indicating that abstract properties of accented speech are learned during adaptation. The control group in Experiment 2 also adapted to the accented voice during the test block, suggesting adaptation can occur within two to four sentences. The results emphasize the flexibility of the human speech processing system and the need for a mechanism to explain this adaptation in models of spoken word recognition. [Research supported by an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship and the University of Arizona Cognitive Science Program.] a)Currently at SUNY at Buffalo, Dept. of Psych., Park Hall, Buffalo, NY 14260, cclarke2@buffalo.edu
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Jiang, Chenghui; Whitehill, Tara L
2014-04-01
Speech errors associated with cleft palate are well established for English and several other Indo-European languages. Few articles describing the speech of Putonghua (standard Mandarin Chinese) speakers with cleft palate have been published in English language journals. Although methodological guidelines have been published for the perceptual speech evaluation of individuals with cleft palate, there has been no critical review of methodological issues in studies of Putonghua speakers with cleft palate. A literature search was conducted to identify relevant studies published over the past 30 years in Chinese language journals. Only studies incorporating perceptual analysis of speech were included. Thirty-seven articles which met inclusion criteria were analyzed and coded on a number of methodological variables. Reliability was established by having all variables recoded for all studies. This critical review identified many methodological issues. These design flaws make it difficult to draw reliable conclusions about characteristic speech errors in this group of speakers. Specific recommendations are made to improve the reliability and validity of future studies, as well to facilitate cross-center comparisons.
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Effect of Accent and Dialect on Employability
Carlson, Holly K.; McHenry, Monica A.
2006-01-01
This study was designed to determine how ethnicity, the amount of perceived accent or dialect, and comprehensibility affect a speaker's employability. Sixty human resource specialists judged 3 female potential applicants. The applicants represented speakers of Spanish-influenced English, Asian-influenced English, and African American Vernacular…
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Challenges Faced by Cantonese Speakers in a UK University Mandarin Course
Lo, Lan
2016-01-01
After Hong Kong returned to China in 1997, those in the Chinese migrant community in the UK who anticipated returning to China saw the significant benefits of learning Mandarin. The challenges are not only related to the social and cultural differences between the Cantonese and Mandarin migrant groups, but also the intrinsic linguistic differences…
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Benefits of Music Training in Mandarin-Speaking Pediatric Cochlear Implant Users
Fu, Qian-Jie; Galvin, John J., III; Wang, Xiaosong; Wu, Jiunn-Liang
2015-01-01
Purpose: The aims of this study were to assess young (5- to 10-year-old) Mandarin-speaking cochlear implant (CI) users' musical pitch perception and to assess the benefits of computer-based home training on performance. Method: Melodic contour identification (MCI) was used to assess musical pitch perception in 14 Mandarin-speaking pediatric CI…
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Chen, Fei; Wong, Lena L. N.; Qiu, Jianxin; Liu, Yehai; Azimi, Behnam; Hu, Yi
2013-01-01
Purpose: This study examined the effects of envelope dynamic-range mismatch on the intelligibility of Mandarin speech in noise by simulated bilateral electric hearing. Method: Noise-vocoded Mandarin speech, corrupted by speech-shaped noise at 5 and 0 dB signal-to-noise ratios, was presented unilaterally or bilaterally to 10 normal-hearing…
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Effect of speech-intrinsic variations on human and automatic recognition of spoken phonemes.
Meyer, Bernd T; Brand, Thomas; Kollmeier, Birger
2011-01-01
The aim of this study is to quantify the gap between the recognition performance of human listeners and an automatic speech recognition (ASR) system with special focus on intrinsic variations of speech, such as speaking rate and effort, altered pitch, and the presence of dialect and accent. Second, it is investigated if the most common ASR features contain all information required to recognize speech in noisy environments by using resynthesized ASR features in listening experiments. For the phoneme recognition task, the ASR system achieved the human performance level only when the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) was increased by 15 dB, which is an estimate for the human-machine gap in terms of the SNR. The major part of this gap is attributed to the feature extraction stage, since human listeners achieve comparable recognition scores when the SNR difference between unaltered and resynthesized utterances is 10 dB. Intrinsic variabilities result in strong increases of error rates, both in human speech recognition (HSR) and ASR (with a relative increase of up to 120%). An analysis of phoneme duration and recognition rates indicates that human listeners are better able to identify temporal cues than the machine at low SNRs, which suggests incorporating information about the temporal dynamics of speech into ASR systems.
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Influence of Musical Expertise on Segmental and Tonal Processing in Mandarin Chinese
Marie, Celine; Delogu, Franco; Lampis, Giulia; Belardinelli, Marta Olivetti; Besson, Mireille
2011-01-01
A same-different task was used to test the hypothesis that musical expertise improves the discrimination of tonal and segmental (consonant, vowel) variations in a tone language, Mandarin Chinese. Two four-word sequences (prime and target) were presented to French musicians and nonmusicians unfamiliar with Mandarin, and event-related brain…
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Joey L. Weidema
2016-06-01
Full Text Available Whether pitch in language and music is governed by domain-specific or domain-general cognitive mechanisms is contentiously debated. The aim of the present study was to investigate whether mechanisms governing pitch contour perception operate differently when pitch information is interpreted as either speech or music. By modulating listening mode, this study aspired to demonstrate that pitch contour perception relies on domain-specific cognitive mechanisms, which are regulated by top-down influences from language and music. Three groups of participants (Mandarin speakers, Dutch speaking non-musicians, and Dutch musicians were exposed to identical pitch contours, and tested on their ability to identify these contours in a language and musical context. Stimuli consisted of disyllabic words spoken in Mandarin, and melodic tonal analogues, embedded in a linguistic and melodic carrier phrase, respectively. Participants classified identical pitch contours as significantly different depending on listening mode. Top-down influences from language appeared to alter the perception of pitch contour in speakers of Mandarin. This was not the case for non-musician speakers of Dutch. Moreover, this effect was lacking in Dutch speaking musicians. The classification patterns of pitch contours in language and music seem to suggest that domain-specific categorization is modulated by top-down influences from language and music.
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Yildiz, Izzet B; von Kriegstein, Katharina; Kiebel, Stefan J
2013-01-01
Our knowledge about the computational mechanisms underlying human learning and recognition of sound sequences, especially speech, is still very limited. One difficulty in deciphering the exact means by which humans recognize speech is that there are scarce experimental findings at a neuronal, microscopic level. Here, we show that our neuronal-computational understanding of speech learning and recognition may be vastly improved by looking at an animal model, i.e., the songbird, which faces the same challenge as humans: to learn and decode complex auditory input, in an online fashion. Motivated by striking similarities between the human and songbird neural recognition systems at the macroscopic level, we assumed that the human brain uses the same computational principles at a microscopic level and translated a birdsong model into a novel human sound learning and recognition model with an emphasis on speech. We show that the resulting Bayesian model with a hierarchy of nonlinear dynamical systems can learn speech samples such as words rapidly and recognize them robustly, even in adverse conditions. In addition, we show that recognition can be performed even when words are spoken by different speakers and with different accents-an everyday situation in which current state-of-the-art speech recognition models often fail. The model can also be used to qualitatively explain behavioral data on human speech learning and derive predictions for future experiments.
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Izzet B Yildiz
Full Text Available Our knowledge about the computational mechanisms underlying human learning and recognition of sound sequences, especially speech, is still very limited. One difficulty in deciphering the exact means by which humans recognize speech is that there are scarce experimental findings at a neuronal, microscopic level. Here, we show that our neuronal-computational understanding of speech learning and recognition may be vastly improved by looking at an animal model, i.e., the songbird, which faces the same challenge as humans: to learn and decode complex auditory input, in an online fashion. Motivated by striking similarities between the human and songbird neural recognition systems at the macroscopic level, we assumed that the human brain uses the same computational principles at a microscopic level and translated a birdsong model into a novel human sound learning and recognition model with an emphasis on speech. We show that the resulting Bayesian model with a hierarchy of nonlinear dynamical systems can learn speech samples such as words rapidly and recognize them robustly, even in adverse conditions. In addition, we show that recognition can be performed even when words are spoken by different speakers and with different accents-an everyday situation in which current state-of-the-art speech recognition models often fail. The model can also be used to qualitatively explain behavioral data on human speech learning and derive predictions for future experiments.
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Li, Jin-rang; Sun, Yan-yan; Xu, Wen
2010-09-01
To design a speech voice sample text with all phonemes in Mandarin for subjective auditory perceptual evaluation of voice disorders. The principles for design of a speech voice sample text are: The short text should include the 21 initials and 39 finals, this may cover all the phonemes in Mandarin. Also, the short text should have some meanings. A short text was made out. It had 155 Chinese words, and included 21 initials and 38 finals (the final, ê, was not included because it was rarely used in Mandarin). Also, the text covered 17 light tones and one "Erhua". The constituent ratios of the initials and finals presented in this short text were statistically similar as those in Mandarin according to the method of similarity of the sample and population (r = 0.742, P text were statistically not similar as those in Mandarin (r = 0.731, P > 0.05). A speech voice sample text with all phonemes in Mandarin was made out. The constituent ratios of the initials and finals presented in this short text are similar as those in Mandarin. Its value for subjective auditory perceptual evaluation of voice disorders need further study.
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Neural Control of Rising and Falling Tones in Mandarin Speakers Who Stutter
Howell, Peter; Jiang, Jing; Peng, Danling; Lu, Chunming
2012-01-01
Neural control of rising and falling tones in Mandarin people who stutter (PWS) was examined by comparing with that which occurs in fluent speakers [Howell, Jiang, Peng, and Lu (2012). Neural control of fundamental frequency rise and fall in Mandarin tones. "Brain and Language, 121"(1), 35-46]. Nine PWS and nine controls were scanned. Functional…
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ASPECTUAL INFLUENCE ON TEMPORAL RELATIONS: A CASE STUDY OF THE EXPERIENTIAL GUO IN MANDARINE
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Jiun-Shiung Wu
2009-12-01
Full Text Available This paper examines how the temporal relation between a clause containing the experiential guo and an adjacent clause is determined. Mandarin is a language not morphologically marked for tenses (e.g., Lin 2006, and therefore, tenses cannot help in determining temporal relations in Mandarin. However, Mandarin has a rich aspectual system. This paper argues that the experiential guo indirectly influences temporal relations via rhetorical relations by either specifying a default rhetorical relation, or by constraining the circumstances under which a certain rhetorical relation can connect a clause with guo to an adjacent clause. This paper also argues that the default rhetorical relation and the constraints are determined by the aspectual properties of the experiential marker. Other information, such as discourse connectors, lexical information, etc., can override the default rhetorical relation indicated by guo and specifies a rhetorical relation. Therefore, this paper concludes that in Mandarin aspect markers can indirectly affect temporal relations by means of rhetorical relations, a result consistent with Wu’s (2005b paper on the perfective marker le in Mandarin, and Wu’s (2007b, 2004 work on the progressive marker zai and the durative marker zhe.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Stephan Heblich
Full Text Available Does it matter if you speak with a regional accent? Speaking immediately reveals something of one's own social and cultural identity, be it consciously or unconsciously. Perceiving accents involves not only reconstructing such imprints but also augmenting them with particular attitudes and stereotypes. Even though we know much about attitudes and stereotypes that are transmitted by, e.g. skin color, names or physical attractiveness, we do not yet have satisfactory answers how accent perception affects human behavior. How do people act in economically relevant contexts when they are confronted with regional accents? This paper reports a laboratory experiment where we address this question. Participants in our experiment conduct cognitive tests where they can choose to either cooperate or compete with a randomly matched male opponent identified only via his rendering of a standardized text in either a regional accent or standard accent. We find a strong connection between the linguistic performance and the cognitive rating of the opponent. When matched with an opponent who speaks the accent of the participant's home region--the in-group opponent--, individuals tend to cooperate significantly more often. By contrast, they are more likely to compete when matched with an accent speaker from outside their home region, the out-group opponent. Our findings demonstrate, firstly, that the perception of an out-group accent leads not only to social discrimination but also influences economic decisions. Secondly, they suggest that this economic behavior is not necessarily attributable to the perception of a regional accent per se, but rather to the social rating of linguistic distance and the in-group/out-group perception it evokes.
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Schipilliti, Luisa; Tranchida, Peter Quinto; Sciarrone, Danilo; Russo, Marina; Dugo, Paola; Dugo, Giovanni; Mondello, Luigi
2010-03-01
Cold-pressed mandarin essential oils are products of great economic importance in many parts of the world and are used in perfumery, as well as in food products. Reconstituted mandarin oils are easy to find on the market; useful information on essential oil authenticity, quality, extraction technique, geographic origin and biogenesis can be attained through high-resolution GC of the volatile fraction, or enantioselective GC, using different chiral stationary phases. Stable isotope ratio analysis has gained considerable interest for the unveiling of citrus oil adulteration, detecting small differences in the isotopic carbon composition and providing plenty of information concerning the discrimination among products of different geographical origin and the adulteration of natural essential oils with synthetic or natural compounds. In the present research, the authenticity of several mandarin essential oils was assessed through the employment of GC hyphenated to isotope ratio MS, conventional GC flame ionization detector, enantioselective GC and HPLC. Commercial mandarin oils and industrial natural (declared as such) mandarin essential oils, characterized by different harvest periods and geographic origins, were subjected to analysis. The results attained were compared with those of genuine cold-pressed Italian mandarin oils, obtained during the 2008-2009 harvest season.
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The importance of a near-native accent. : Do the Dutch speak English or Double Dutch?
drs. Frans Hermans
2014-01-01
The importance of a near-native accent. This talk will discuss whether or not it is important for EFL-teachers to try and achieve a near-native generally accepted accent for their students. The focus will be on the credibility of non-native speakers of English while speaking English in a
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Balbin, Jessie R.; Padilla, Dionis A.; Fausto, Janette C.; Vergara, Ernesto M.; Garcia, Ramon G.; Delos Angeles, Bethsedea Joy S.; Dizon, Neil John A.; Mardo, Mark Kevin N.
2017-02-01
This research is about translating series of hand gesture to form a word and produce its equivalent sound on how it is read and said in Filipino accent using Support Vector Machine and Mel Frequency Cepstral Coefficient analysis. The concept is to detect Filipino speech input and translate the spoken words to their text form in Filipino. This study is trying to help the Filipino deaf community to impart their thoughts through the use of hand gestures and be able to communicate to people who do not know how to read hand gestures. This also helps literate deaf to simply read the spoken words relayed to them using the Filipino speech to text system.
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A tutoring package to teach pronunciation of Mandarin Chinese characters.
Wu, Hang; Miller, L Keith
2007-01-01
We examined the effects of a tutoring package (verbal modeling, prompts, and contingent praise/ Chinese conversations with the tutor) on the performance of a college student's Mandarin Chinese pronunciation. The effects of the tutoring package were analyzed using a multiple baseline design across two sets of 50 Chinese characters. The tutoring package produced improvement in the student's correct pronunciation of Chinese characters from 48% (pretutoring) to 90% (posttutoring). Results suggested that the tutoring package produced mastery pronunciation of targeted Mandarin Chinese vocalizations by a nonnative speaker.
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Acoustic cues to perception of word stress by English, Mandarin, and Russian speakers.
Chrabaszcz, Anna; Winn, Matthew; Lin, Candise Y; Idsardi, William J
2014-08-01
This study investigated how listeners' native language affects their weighting of acoustic cues (such as vowel quality, pitch, duration, and intensity) in the perception of contrastive word stress. Native speakers (N = 45) of typologically diverse languages (English, Russian, and Mandarin) performed a stress identification task on nonce disyllabic words with fully crossed combinations of each of the 4 cues in both syllables. The results revealed that although the vowel quality cue was the strongest cue for all groups of listeners, pitch was the second strongest cue for the English and the Mandarin listeners but was virtually disregarded by the Russian listeners. Duration and intensity cues were used by the Russian listeners to a significantly greater extent compared with the English and Mandarin participants. Compared with when cues were noncontrastive across syllables, cues were stronger when they were in the iambic contour than when they were in the trochaic contour. Although both English and Russian are stress languages and Mandarin is a tonal language, stress perception performance of the Mandarin listeners but not of the Russian listeners is more similar to that of the native English listeners, both in terms of weighting of the acoustic cues and the cues' relative strength in different word positions. The findings suggest that tuning of second-language prosodic perceptions is not entirely predictable by prosodic similarities across languages.
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Development of Mandarin spoken language after pediatric cochlear implantation.
Li, Bei; Soli, Sigfrid D; Zheng, Yun; Li, Gang; Meng, Zhaoli
2014-07-01
The purpose of this study was to evaluate early spoken language development in young Mandarin-speaking children during the first 24 months after cochlear implantation, as measured by receptive and expressive vocabulary growth rates. Growth rates were compared with those of normally hearing children and with growth rates for English-speaking children with cochlear implants. Receptive and expressive vocabularies were measured with the simplified short form (SSF) version of the Mandarin Communicative Development Inventory (MCDI) in a sample of 112 pediatric implant recipients at baseline, 3, 6, 12, and 24 months after implantation. Implant ages ranged from 1 to 5 years. Scores were expressed in terms of normal equivalent ages, allowing normalized vocabulary growth rates to be determined. Scores for English-speaking children were re-expressed in these terms, allowing direct comparisons of Mandarin and English early spoken language development. Vocabulary growth rates during the first 12 months after implantation were similar to those for normally hearing children less than 16 months of age. Comparisons with growth rates for normally hearing children 16-30 months of age showed that the youngest implant age group (1-2 years) had an average growth rate of 0.68 that of normally hearing children; while the middle implant age group (2-3 years) had an average growth rate of 0.65; and the oldest implant age group (>3 years) had an average growth rate of 0.56, significantly less than the other two rates. Growth rates for English-speaking children with cochlear implants were 0.68 in the youngest group, 0.54 in the middle group, and 0.57 in the oldest group. Growth rates in the middle implant age groups for the two languages differed significantly. The SSF version of the MCDI is suitable for assessment of Mandarin language development during the first 24 months after cochlear implantation. Effects of implant age and duration of implantation can be compared directly across
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Early Mandarin Literacy in a Class-created Reading Library
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Reed Riggs
2017-06-01
Full Text Available This article explores methods for creating an extensive reading (ER library during the first weeks of language instruction, illustrated here in a college Mandarin course. Data include student-created texts, video transcripts of students reading in groups, field notes, and a student perceptions survey. Taken together the data provide a snapshot of how students in a beginning-level university Mandarin course can utilize Internet resources to create and use a personalized ER library. ER has been shown in previous research to enrich known words (Waring & Takaki, 2003, and provide opportunities for early literacy in languages that use nonalphabetic scripts like Japanese (Hitosugi & Day, 2004. Mandarin texts feature Chinese characters, which exhibit a low reliability in sound-meaning-visual associations, effectively blocking learners from sounding out unfamiliar words and clearly identifying meaning (Everson et al., 2016. The data here show how learners were able to connect prior knowledge from their own culture to new communicative situations in the form of printed comic books to read in class in small groups. Learners were found to connect understandings between their own culture and the target culture, focusing particularly on cultural similarities.
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Idiom Comprehension in Mandarin-Speaking Children
Hsieh, Shelley Ching-Yu; Hsu, Chun-Chieh Natalie
2010-01-01
This study examines the effect of familiarity, context, and linguistic convention on idiom comprehension in Mandarin speaking children. Two experiments (a comprehension task followed by a comprehension task coupled with a metapragmatic task) were administered to test participants in three age groups (6 and 9-year-olds, and an adult control group).…
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Developmental Eye Movement (DEM Test Norms for Mandarin Chinese-Speaking Chinese Children.
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Yachun Xie
Full Text Available The Developmental Eye Movement (DEM test is commonly used as a clinical visual-verbal ocular motor assessment tool to screen and diagnose reading problems at the onset. No established norm exists for using the DEM test with Mandarin Chinese-speaking Chinese children. This study aims to establish the normative values of the DEM test for the Mandarin Chinese-speaking population in China; it also aims to compare the values with three other published norms for English-, Spanish-, and Cantonese-speaking Chinese children. A random stratified sampling method was used to recruit children from eight kindergartens and eight primary schools in the main urban and suburban areas of Nanjing. A total of 1,425 Mandarin Chinese-speaking children aged 5 to 12 years took the DEM test in Mandarin Chinese. A digital recorder was used to record the process. All of the subjects completed a symptomatology survey, and their DEM scores were determined by a trained tester. The scores were computed using the formula in the DEM manual, except that the "vertical scores" were adjusted by taking the vertical errors into consideration. The results were compared with the three other published norms. In our subjects, a general decrease with age was observed for the four eye movement indexes: vertical score, adjusted horizontal score, ratio, and total error. For both the vertical and adjusted horizontal scores, the Mandarin Chinese-speaking children completed the tests much more quickly than the norms for English- and Spanish-speaking children. However, the same group completed the test slightly more slowly than the norms for Cantonese-speaking children. The differences in the means were significant (P0.05; compared with Spanish-speaking children, the scores were statistically significant (P0.05. DEM norms may be affected by differences in language, cultural, and educational systems among various ethnicities. The norms of the DEM test are proposed for use with Mandarin Chinese
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Does Mandarin spatial metaphor for time influence Chinese deaf signers’ spatio-temporal reasoning?
Gu, Yan; Zheng, Yeqiu; Swerts, Marc; Gunzelmann, G.; Howes, A.; Tenbrink, T.; Davelaar, E. J.
2017-01-01
In Mandarin Chinese, the space-time word “前/qian” is used to express both the spatial concept of front/forward and the temporal concept of early/before (e.g., “前天/qian-tian”, literally front day, meaning the day before yesterday). This is consistent with the fact that Mandarin speakers can gesture
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Learner Performance in Mandarin Immersion and High School World Language Programs: A Comparison
Xu, Xiaoqiu; Padilla, Amado M.; Silva, Duarte M.
2015-01-01
This study compared the Mandarin performance of elementary immersion program students and high school world language program students in the same school district. A cross-sectional design was employed to gather information on Mandarin proficiency of fourth and fifth graders and Level 4 and Level 5 (AP Chinese) high school students who took the…
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Killiny, Nabil; Valim, Maria Filomena; Jones, Shelley E; Omar, Ahmad A; Hijaz, Faraj; Gmitter, Fred G; Grosser, Jude W
2017-07-01
Huanglongbing (HLB) is currently considered the most destructive disease of citrus. Since its spread to the Americas, HLB has killed millions of trees and caused a sharp decline in production in many citrus growing regions. With the continuous spread of HLB disease in Florida and worldwide, there is an urgent need for the development of commercial citrus cultivars with a strong tolerance to HLB. Interestingly, field observations showed that some of the recently released mandarin hybrids such as 'Sugar Belle' were tolerant to HLB. In this study, we investigated the volatile and non-volatile metabolites of greenhouse-grown 'Sugar Belle' mandarin and four of its ancestors in order to understand why 'Sugar Belle' mandarin is relatively tolerant to HLB. Leaf volatiles were directly extracted with hexane and analyzed using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). Leaf polar metabolites were extracted with a mixture of methanol:water (1:1, v/v), derivatized to their trimethylsilyl ethers, and analyzed using GC-MS. Forty-seven volatile compounds and forty-two polar metabolites were detected in 'Sugar Belle' mandarin leaves and its ancestors. 'Sugar Belle' was high in several volatiles such as α-thujene, para-cymene, γ-terpinene, thymol, β-elemene, and (E)-β-caryophyllene. Some of these volatiles, especially thymol, β-elemene, and (E)-β-caryophyllene are known for their anti-microbial activity. In addition, 'Sugar Belle' mandarin was the highest in synephrine, benzoic acid, ferulic acid, caffeic acid, chiro-inositol, fructose, glucose, threonic acid, saccharic acid, and galactaric acid, and the second in threonine, malic acid, and myo-inositol compared to the ancestors. Phenolic compounds such as benzoic, ferulic, and caffeic acids may act as antibacterial agents, whereas others like sugar alcohols may protect 'Sugar Belle' mandarin from stress during pathogen attack. The tolerance of 'Sugar Belle' and other newly released mandarin hybrids should be further
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Moyer, Alene
2018-01-01
Age of onset has long been assumed to predict outcomes in second/foreign language accent. Yet beyond early childhood, acquiring a new accent has much to do with social-affective factors such as learner identity and motivation, as well as cognitive factors such as learning strategies (Pfenninger, 2017). Newer perspectives acknowledge this…
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Chung, Wei-Lun; Jarmulowicz, Linda; Bidelman, Gavin M.
2017-01-01
This study examined language-specific links among auditory processing, linguistic prosody awareness, and Mandarin (L1) and English (L2) word reading in 61 Mandarin-speaking, English-learning children. Three auditory discrimination abilities were measured: pitch contour, pitch interval, and rise time (rate of intensity change at tone onset).…
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Tone Attrition in Mandarin Speakers of Varying English Proficiency
Creel, Sarah C.
2017-01-01
Purpose The purpose of this study was to determine whether the degree of dominance of Mandarin–English bilinguals' languages affects phonetic processing of tone content in their native language, Mandarin. Method We tested 72 Mandarin–English bilingual college students with a range of language-dominance profiles in the 2 languages and ages of acquisition of English. Participants viewed 2 photographs at a time while hearing a familiar Mandarin word referring to 1 photograph. The names of the 2 photographs diverged in tone, vowels, or both. Word recognition was evaluated using clicking accuracy, reaction times, and an online recognition measure (gaze) and was compared in the 3 conditions. Results Relative proficiency in English was correlated with reduced word recognition success in tone-disambiguated trials, but not in vowel-disambiguated trials, across all 3 dependent measures. This selective attrition for tone content emerged even though all bilinguals had learned Mandarin from birth. Lengthy experience with English thus weakened tone use. Conclusions This finding has implications for the question of the extent to which bilinguals' 2 phonetic systems interact. It suggests that bilinguals may not process pitch information language-specifically and that processing strategies from the dominant language may affect phonetic processing in the nondominant language—even when the latter was learned natively. PMID:28124064
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Pointed and plateau-shaped pitch accents in North Frisian
DEFF Research Database (Denmark)
Niebuhr, Oliver; Hoekstra, Jarich
2015-01-01
for language documentation and conservation purposes. We selected a small part of this corpus – interviews of 10 elderly speakers – and conducted multiparametric F0 and duration measurements, focusing on nuclear rising-falling pitch accent patterns. We found strong evidence for a phonological pitch...
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Mandarin functional MRI Language paradigms
Ci, He; van Graan, Andre; Gonz?lvez, Gloria; Thompson, Pamela; Hill, Andrea; Duncan, John S.
2016-01-01
Abstract Objective The objective of this study was to implement convenient, fast, and accurate Mandarin task paradigms for functional MRI, and to locate the Chinese language functional areas in frontal and temporal lobes. Materials and Methods Nineteen healthy Chinese volunteers participated in this study, which utilized a block design with four language tasks: auditory naming (AN), picture naming (PN), verbal fluency?character (VFC), and verbal fluency?letter (VFL). All functional images wer...
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Ying, Y.; Mursitama, T. N.; Theresia; Mariana
2018-03-01
The study discusses the importance of improving the competency of Indonesian-Mandarin translators to increase economic relations between Indonesia and China. As China’s investment in Indonesia expands in various industry sectors, the need for qualified translators escalates. However, the situation described that Indonesia lacks competent and qualified translators in Mandarin. The study adopts the qualitative approach. Technically, the study utilizes a variety of secondary data consisting of documents, books, publications, and website to collect data based on the needs of qualified translators and how to improve their competency. In addition, primary data collection involves industry and translation service providers, from high schools, vocational schools, colleges, and Chinese language courses through interviews. In this respect, the study contributes to the development of the Mandarin Chinese translator competency through professional translator training programs. The competencies developed include Mandarin language skills in a variety of contexts or themes such as business, industry, accounting, taxation, law, and socio-political issues. The findings of this research indicate the significance to complement the lack of knowledge and skills that are not acquired during the college. Importantly, the authors propose a professional interpreter training model to meet the demand of Chinese investors in Indonesia eventually.
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Temporal construals of bare predicates in Mandarin Chinese
Sun, Hongyuan
2014-01-01
This dissertation contributes to the research on tense and eventualities across languages. It presents the first systematic investigation and detailed theoretical analysis of the temporal interpretations of sentences with bare (aspectually unmarked) predicates in Mandarin. Traditionally considered
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Are you a good mimic? Neuro-acoustic signatures for speech imitation ability
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Susanne Maria Reiterer
2013-10-01
Full Text Available We investigated individual differences in speech imitation ability in late bilinguals using a neuro-acoustic approach. 138 German-English bilinguals matched on various behavioral measures were tested for speech imitation ability in a foreign language, Hindi, and categorised into high and low ability groups. Brain activations and speech recordings were obtained from 26 participants from the two extreme groups as they performed a functional neuroimaging experiment which required them to imitate sentences in three conditions: (A German, (B English and (C German with fake English accent. We used recently developed novel acoustic analysis, namely the ‘articulation space’ as a metric to compare speech imitation abilities of the two groups. Across all three conditions, direct comparisons between the two groups, revealed brain activations (FWE corrected, p< 0.05 that were more widespread with significantly higher peak activity in the left supramarginal gyrus and postcentral areas for the low ability group. The high ability group, on the other hand showed significantly larger articulation space in all three conditions. In addition, articulation space also correlated positively with imitation ability (Pearson’s r=0.7, p<0.01. Our results suggest that an expanded articulation space for high ability individuals allows access to a larger repertoire of sounds, thereby providing skilled imitators greater flexibility in pronunciation and language learning.
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Being the corresponding accents of red in one interior and one exterior as
Sandeva, Vaska; Despot, Katerina; Namicev, Petar; Ignatov, Aleksandar
2013-01-01
What is the emphasis in the interior and what is exterior accent? Thair next goal is to attract attention and to clarify the answer to his location i.e. to highlight the special effect of the composition, which we have set. The color is the emphasis that has been selected for analysis. From the color palette, accent color is red, a primary color and while contrast to green or color that represented 60% of the exterior and is dominant. Ability of the human eye to focus and take depending on th...
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Chen, Chen-Yuan; Chung, Wan-Lin
2011-01-01
As Mandarin gains popularity in the whole world, Mandarin education becomes valued by the countries all over the world. The United Nations classifies Mandarin as one of the six major languages, and the number of people who learn Mandarin in the whole world grows with each passing day as the mainland China market grows. This study discusses the…
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Foreign accent, cognitive load and intelligibility of EMI lectures
DEFF Research Database (Denmark)
Jensen, Christian; Thøgersen, Jacob
2017-01-01
This study investigated the effect of foreign accent on the understanding of spoken texts in two different contexts: (1) when listeners extract surface level meaning of simple utterances, labelled “intelligibility in simple tasks” (IS) below, and (2) when they answer content questions to a complex...
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ACCENT-BIAFLUX workshop 2005, trace gas and aerosol flux measurement and techniques. Abstract book
Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)
Werner, A.; Soerensen, L.L. (eds.)
2005-04-01
The woorkshop trace gas and aerosol flux measurement techniques in the second meeting within the Biosphere Atmosphere Exchange of Pollutions (BIAFLUX) group in the EU-network project Atmospheric Composition Change (ACCENT). The goal of the workshop is to obtain an overview of techniques for measurements of gas and aerosol fluxes and to gather the knowledge of uncertainties in flux measurements and calculations. The workshop is funded by ACCENT. The abstract book presents abstracts of 21 oral presentations and 26 poster presentations. (LN)
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A hypothesis on improving foreign accents by optimizing variability in vocal learning brain circuits
Simmonds, Anna J.
2015-01-01
Rapid vocal motor learning is observed when acquiring a language in early childhood, or learning to speak another language later in life. Accurate pronunciation is one of the hardest things for late learners to master and they are almost always left with a non-native accent. Here, I propose a novel hypothesis that this accent could be improved by optimizing variability in vocal learning brain circuits during learning. Much of the neurobiology of human vocal motor learning has been inferred fr...
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Fruit photosynthesis in Satsuma mandarin.
Hiratsuka, Shin; Suzuki, Mayu; Nishimura, Hiroshi; Nada, Kazuyoshi
2015-12-01
To clarify detailed characteristics of fruit photosynthesis, possible gas exchange pathway and photosynthetic response to different environments were investigated in Satsuma mandarin (Citrus unshiu). About 300 mm(-2) stomata were present on fruit surface during young stages (∼10-30 mm diameter fruit) and each stoma increased in size until approximately 88 days after full bloom (DAFB), while the stomata collapsed steadily thereafter; more than 50% stomata deformed at 153 DAFB. The transpiration rate of the fruit appeared to match with stoma development and its intactness rather than the density. Gross photosynthetic rate of the rind increased gradually with increasing CO2 up to 500 ppm but decreased at higher concentrations, which may resemble C4 photosynthesis. In contrast, leaf photosynthesis increased constantly with CO2 increment. Although both fruit and leaf photosynthesis were accelerated by rising photosynthetic photon flux density (PPFD), fruit photosynthesis was greater under considerably lower PPFD from 13.5 to 68 μmolm(-2)s(-1). Thus, Satsuma mandarin fruit appears to incorporate CO2 through fully developed and non-collapsed stomata, and subject it to fruit photosynthesis, which may be characterized as intermediate status among C3, C4 and shade plant photosynthesis. The device of fruit photosynthesis may develop differently from its leaf to capture CO2 efficiently. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.
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Lowit, Anja; Kuschmann, Anja
2012-01-01
Purpose: The autosegmental-metrical (AM) framework represents an established methodology for intonational analysis in unimpaired speaker populations but has found little application in describing intonation in motor speech disorders (MSDs). This study compared the intonation patterns of unimpaired participants (CON) and those with Parkinson's…
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Lepeduš, Hrvoje; Jozić, Marko; Štolfa, Ivna; Pavičić, Nikola; Hackenberger, Branimir K.; Cesar, Vera
2005-01-01
The Unshiu mandarin (Citrus unshiu Marc.) is the major Citrus crop in Croatia. Limiting factors for longer consumption of Unshiu mandarin are low storage performance and the appearance of chilling injuries during storage. Previous studies indicated that oxidative stress might be involved in cold-induced peel damage of harvested Citrus fruit. The aim of the present study was to investigate peroxidase distribution, isoenzyme pattern and activity in the peel of Unshiu mandarin fruit. Special goa...
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In vitro flowering in embryogenic cultures of Kinnow mandarin ...
African Journals Online (AJOL)
AJB SERVER
2006-08-17
Aug 17, 2006 ... Embryogenic cultures of Kinnow mandarin (C. nobilis Lour × C. deliciosa Tenora) were raised from unfertilized ovules ... development of efficient plant tissue culture procedures for in vitro ..... epiphytic orchid. Plant Physiol.
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Language related differences of the sustained response evoked by natural speech sounds.
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Christina Siu-Dschu Fan
Full Text Available In tonal languages, such as Mandarin Chinese, the pitch contour of vowels discriminates lexical meaning, which is not the case in non-tonal languages such as German. Recent data provide evidence that pitch processing is influenced by language experience. However, there are still many open questions concerning the representation of such phonological and language-related differences at the level of the auditory cortex (AC. Using magnetoencephalography (MEG, we recorded transient and sustained auditory evoked fields (AEF in native Chinese and German speakers to investigate language related phonological and semantic aspects in the processing of acoustic stimuli. AEF were elicited by spoken meaningful and meaningless syllables, by vowels, and by a French horn tone. Speech sounds were recorded from a native speaker and showed frequency-modulations according to the pitch-contours of Mandarin. The sustained field (SF evoked by natural speech signals was significantly larger for Chinese than for German listeners. In contrast, the SF elicited by a horn tone was not significantly different between groups. Furthermore, the SF of Chinese subjects was larger when evoked by meaningful syllables compared to meaningless ones, but there was no significant difference regarding whether vowels were part of the Chinese phonological system or not. Moreover, the N100m gave subtle but clear evidence that for Chinese listeners other factors than purely physical properties play a role in processing meaningful signals. These findings show that the N100 and the SF generated in Heschl's gyrus are influenced by language experience, which suggests that AC activity related to specific pitch contours of vowels is influenced in a top-down fashion by higher, language related areas. Such interactions are in line with anatomical findings and neuroimaging data, as well as with the dual-stream model of language of Hickok and Poeppel that highlights the close and reciprocal interaction
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Language related differences of the sustained response evoked by natural speech sounds.
Fan, Christina Siu-Dschu; Zhu, Xingyu; Dosch, Hans Günter; von Stutterheim, Christiane; Rupp, André
2017-01-01
In tonal languages, such as Mandarin Chinese, the pitch contour of vowels discriminates lexical meaning, which is not the case in non-tonal languages such as German. Recent data provide evidence that pitch processing is influenced by language experience. However, there are still many open questions concerning the representation of such phonological and language-related differences at the level of the auditory cortex (AC). Using magnetoencephalography (MEG), we recorded transient and sustained auditory evoked fields (AEF) in native Chinese and German speakers to investigate language related phonological and semantic aspects in the processing of acoustic stimuli. AEF were elicited by spoken meaningful and meaningless syllables, by vowels, and by a French horn tone. Speech sounds were recorded from a native speaker and showed frequency-modulations according to the pitch-contours of Mandarin. The sustained field (SF) evoked by natural speech signals was significantly larger for Chinese than for German listeners. In contrast, the SF elicited by a horn tone was not significantly different between groups. Furthermore, the SF of Chinese subjects was larger when evoked by meaningful syllables compared to meaningless ones, but there was no significant difference regarding whether vowels were part of the Chinese phonological system or not. Moreover, the N100m gave subtle but clear evidence that for Chinese listeners other factors than purely physical properties play a role in processing meaningful signals. These findings show that the N100 and the SF generated in Heschl's gyrus are influenced by language experience, which suggests that AC activity related to specific pitch contours of vowels is influenced in a top-down fashion by higher, language related areas. Such interactions are in line with anatomical findings and neuroimaging data, as well as with the dual-stream model of language of Hickok and Poeppel that highlights the close and reciprocal interaction between
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Ivanović, Žarko; Perović, Tatjana; Popović, Tatjana; Blagojević, Jovana; Trkulja, Nenad; Hrnčić, Snježana
2017-02-01
Citrus blast caused by bacterium Pseudomonas syringae is a very important disease of citrus occuring in many areas of the world, but with few data about genetic structure of the pathogen involved. Considering the above fact, this study reports genetic characterization of 43 P. syringae isolates obtained from plant tissue displaying citrus blast symptoms on mandarin ( Citrus reticulata ) in Montenegro, using multilocus sequence analysis of gyrB , rpoD , and gap1 gene sequences. Gene sequences from a collection of 54 reference pathotype strains of P. syringae from the Plant Associated and Environmental Microbes Database (PAMDB) was used to establish a genetic relationship with our isolates obtained from mandarin. Phylogenetic analyses of gyrB , rpoD , and gap1 gene sequences showed that P. syringae pv. syringae causes citrus blast in mandarin in Montenegro, and belongs to genomospecies 1. Genetic homogeneity of isolates suggested that the Montenegrian population might be clonal which indicates a possible common source of infection. These findings may assist in further epidemiological studies of this pathogen and for determining mandarin breeding strategies for P. syringae control.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Žarko Ivanović
2017-02-01
Full Text Available Citrus blast caused by bacterium Pseudomonas syringae is a very important disease of citrus occuring in many areas of the world, but with few data about genetic structure of the pathogen involved. Considering the above fact, this study reports genetic characterization of 43 P. syringae isolates obtained from plant tissue displaying citrus blast symptoms on mandarin (Citrus reticulata in Montenegro, using multilocus sequence analysis of gyrB, rpoD, and gap1 gene sequences. Gene sequences from a collection of 54 reference pathotype strains of P. syringae from the Plant Associated and Environmental Microbes Database (PAMDB was used to establish a genetic relationship with our isolates obtained from mandarin. Phylogenetic analyses of gyrB, rpoD, and gap1 gene sequences showed that P. syringae pv. syringae causes citrus blast in mandarin in Montenegro, and belongs to genomospecies 1. Genetic homogeneity of isolates suggested that the Montenegrian population might be clonal which indicates a possible common source of infection. These findings may assist in further epidemiological studies of this pathogen and for determining mandarin breeding strategies for P. syringae control.
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Dried apple enriched with mandarin juice counteracts tamoxifen induced oxidative stress in rats.
CODOÑER FRANCH, PILAR; Betoret Valls, María Ester; López Jaén, Ana Belén; Betoret Valls, Noelia; Fito Maupoey, Pedro; Valls Bellés, Maria Victoria
2013-01-01
[EN] The effect of a product made of dehydrated apples enriched with mandarin juice by vacuum impregnation on markers of oxidative stress (plasma antioxidant capacity, carbonyl groups (CGs), 8-hydroxydeoxyguanosine (8OHdG) and alpha-tocopherol) was tested in rats. Six groups of animals were studied: one group was fed a standard diet; two groups were supplemented with dehydrated apple either impregnated or not with mandarin juice throughout 28 days; and three groups (one unsupplemented and two...
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Hara, Yuko; Shiraishi, Atsushi; Sakane, Yuri; Takezawa, Yuki; Kamao, Tomoyuki; Ohashi, Yuichi; Yasunaga, Sho; Sugahara, Takuya
2017-06-01
To evaluate the effects of mandarin orange yogurt containing nobiletin and β-lactoglobulin on the allergic conjunctivitis induced by a conjunctival allergen challenge (CAC). Experiment 1 was performed on 26 asymptomatic patients (age, 25.3 ± 5.3 years) with proven seasonal allergic conjunctivitis due to cedar pollen. We compared the degree of conjunctivitis induced by CAC before and after ingesting mandarin orange yogurt for 2 weeks. Experiment 2 was a double-blind, placebo-controlled trial performed on 31 patients (age, 32.5 ± 12.2 years). A diet containing mandarin orange yogurt was compared to a diet containing yogurt lacking the mandarin orange on the conjunctivitis induced by CAC. The temperature of the inferior bulbar conjunctiva was measured before and 20 minutes after the CAC with an ocular surface thermographer (OST). The degree of conjunctival injection and chemosis was graded by slit-lamp biomicroscopy. The changes in the symptoms were evaluated by a questionnaire. In experiment 1, the scores of redness (3.07 ± 3.03 vs. 1.05 ± 1.70), chemosis (2.84 ± 2.27 vs. 0.81 ± 1.11), itching (4.34 ± 3.05 vs. 1.39 ± 2.12), and temperature (0.73 ± 0.42°C vs. 0.45 ± 0.43°C) were significantly lower (P yogurt for 2 weeks. In experiment 2, the scores of redness (1.03 ± 0.18 vs. 1.28 ± 0.52; P = 0.0156), itching (1.93 ± 1.92 vs. 2.82 ± 2.21; P = 0.0133), and surface temperature (0.54 ± 0.21°C vs. 0.31 ± 0.25°C; P yogurt group than in the control yogurt group. Mandarin orange yogurt can be an effective nutritional intervention for allergic conjunctivitis.
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Metaphors for Happiness in English and Mandarin Chinese
Polley, Carl A.
2012-01-01
Patterns of conceptualization reflected in figurative language are motivated by embodied experience, and comparisons of emotion metaphors in English, Mandarin Chinese and other languages have shown widespread similarity in such metaphors cross-culturally (Lakoff & Johnson 1980, 1999; King 1989; Yu 1996; Kovecses 2005). Nonetheless, we can also…
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Wh-Questions, Universal Statements and Free Choice Inferences in Child Mandarin.
Huang, Haiquan; Zhou, Peng; Crain, Stephen
2017-11-16
This study investigated 5-year-old Mandarin-speaking children's comprehension of wh-questions, universal statements and free choice inferences. Previous research has found that Mandarin-speaking children assign a universal interpretation to sentences with a wh-word (e.g., shei 'who') followed by the adverbial quantifier dou 'all' (Zhou in Appl Psycholinguist 36:411-435, 2013). Children also compute free choice inferences in sentences that contain a modal verb in addition to a wh-word and dou (Zhou, in: Nakayama, Su, Huang (eds.) Studies in Chinese and Japanese language acquisition: in honour of Stephen Crain. John Benjamins Publishing Company, Amsterdam, pp 223-235, 2017). The present study used a Question-Statement Task to assess children's interpretation of sentences containing shei + dou, both with and without the modal verb beiyunxu 'was allowed to', as well as the contrast between sentences with shei + dou, which are statements for adults, versus ones with dou + shei, which are wh-questions for adults. The 5-year-old Mandarin-speaking child participants exhibited adult-like linguistic knowledge of the semantics and pragmatics of wh-words, the adverbial quantifier dou, and the deontic modal verb beiyunxu.
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Benefits of music training in mandarin-speaking pediatric cochlear implant users.
Fu, Qian-Jie; Galvin, John J; Wang, Xiaosong; Wu, Jiunn-Liang
2015-02-01
The aims of this study were to assess young (5- to 10-year-old) Mandarin-speaking cochlear implant (CI) users' musical pitch perception and to assess the benefits of computer-based home training on performance. Melodic contour identification (MCI) was used to assess musical pitch perception in 14 Mandarin-speaking pediatric CI users; the instrument timbre and the contour length were varied as experimental parameters. Six subjects received subsequent MCI training on their home computer in which auditory and visual feedback were provided. MCI performance was generally poor (grand mean=33.3% correct) and highly variable, with scores ranging from 9.3% to 98.1% correct; there was no significant effect of instrument timbre or contour length on performance (p>.05). After 4 weeks of training, performance sharply improved. Follow-up measures that were conducted 8 weeks after training was stopped showed no significant decline in MCI performance. For the 6 trained subjects, there was a significant effect of contour length for the training and follow-up measures. These preliminary data suggest that although baseline MCI performance initially may be poor, training may greatly improve Mandarin-speaking pediatric CI users' melodic pitch perception.
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The Accent-protocol: a framework for benchmarking and model evaluation
Builtjes, P.J.H.; Grewe, V.; Moussiopoulos, N.; Borrego, C.; Isaksen, I.S.A.; Volz-Thomas, A.
2011-01-01
We summarise results from a workshop on “Model Benchmarking and Quality Assurance” of the EU-Network of Excellence ACCENT, including results from other activities (e.g. COST Action 732) and publications. A formalised evaluation protocol is presented, i.e. a generic formalism describing the procedure
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Robust speech perception: Recognize the familiar, generalize to the similar, and adapt to the novel
Kleinschmidt, Dave F.; Jaeger, T. Florian
2016-01-01
Successful speech perception requires that listeners map the acoustic signal to linguistic categories. These mappings are not only probabilistic, but change depending on the situation. For example, one talker’s /p/ might be physically indistinguishable from another talker’s /b/ (cf. lack of invariance). We characterize the computational problem posed by such a subjectively non-stationary world and propose that the speech perception system overcomes this challenge by (1) recognizing previously encountered situations, (2) generalizing to other situations based on previous similar experience, and (3) adapting to novel situations. We formalize this proposal in the ideal adapter framework: (1) to (3) can be understood as inference under uncertainty about the appropriate generative model for the current talker, thereby facilitating robust speech perception despite the lack of invariance. We focus on two critical aspects of the ideal adapter. First, in situations that clearly deviate from previous experience, listeners need to adapt. We develop a distributional (belief-updating) learning model of incremental adaptation. The model provides a good fit against known and novel phonetic adaptation data, including perceptual recalibration and selective adaptation. Second, robust speech recognition requires listeners learn to represent the structured component of cross-situation variability in the speech signal. We discuss how these two aspects of the ideal adapter provide a unifying explanation for adaptation, talker-specificity, and generalization across talkers and groups of talkers (e.g., accents and dialects). The ideal adapter provides a guiding framework for future investigations into speech perception and adaptation, and more broadly language comprehension. PMID:25844873
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[Dichotic perception of Mandarin third tone by Mexican Chinese learners].
Wang, Hongbin
2014-05-01
To investigate the relationship between the advantage ear (cerebral hemisphere) of Spanish-speaking Mexican learners and the third Chinese tone. Third tone Chinese vowel syllables were used as experimental materials with dichotic listening technology to test the Spanish-speaking Mexican Chinese learners (20-32 years old) who studied Chinese about 20 h. In terms of error rates to identify the third Chinese tone, the Spanish-speaking Mexican Chinese learners's reaction to the third tone suggested that their left ears were the advantageous ear (the right cerebral hemisphere) (Z=-2.091, P=0.036). The verbal information of tones influenced the perception of Mexican Chinese learners' mandarin tones. In the process of learning mandarin tones, Mexican Chinese learners gradually formed the category of tones.
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Improving Tone Recognition with Nucleus Modeling and Sequential Learning
Wang, Siwei
2010-01-01
Mandarin Chinese and many other tonal languages use tones that are defined as specific pitch patterns to distinguish syllables otherwise ambiguous. It had been shown that tones carry at least as much information as vowels in Mandarin Chinese [Surendran et al., 2005]. Surprisingly, though, many speech recognition systems for Mandarin Chinese have…
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Constraints of Tones, Vowels and Consonants on Lexical Selection in Mandarin Chinese.
Wiener, Seth; Turnbull, Rory
2016-03-01
Previous studies have shown that when speakers of European languages are asked to turn nonwords into words by altering either a vowel or consonant, they tend to treat vowels as more mutable than consonants. These results inspired the universal vowel mutability hypothesis: listeners learn to cope with vowel variability because vowel information constrains lexical selection less tightly and allows for more potential candidates than does consonant information. The present study extends the word reconstruction paradigm to Mandarin Chinese--a Sino-Tibetan language, which makes use of lexically contrastive tone. Native speakers listened to word-like nonwords (e.g., su3) and were asked to change them into words by manipulating a single consonant (e.g., tu3), vowel (e.g., si3), or tone (e.g., su4). Additionally, items were presented in a fourth condition in which participants could change any part. The participants' reaction times and responses were recorded. Results revealed that participants responded faster and more accurately in both the free response and the tonal change conditions. Unlike previous reconstruction studies on European languages, where vowels were changed faster and more often than consonants, these results demonstrate that, in Mandarin, changes to vowels and consonants were both overshadowed by changes to tone, which was the preferred modification to the stimulus nonwords, while changes to vowels were the slowest and least accurate. Our findings show that the universal vowel mutability hypothesis is not consistent with a tonal language, that Mandarin tonal information is lower-priority than consonants and vowels and that vowel information most tightly constrains Mandarin lexical access.
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Hijir, Putri
2016-01-01
The background of this research was the effect of Customer to Customer Interaction affect satisfaction, word of mouth, in mandarin oriental hotel. The objective of this research is to examine the impact of Customer satisfaction, Service Atmosphere, Personal Interaction, Customer Customer Interaction, Word of Mouth. The design of this research applies primary data obtained by distributing questionnaires to 200 customer who are using Mandarin Oriental Hotel. Data analysis method used in this re...
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Ľudmila Nagyová
2014-11-01
Full Text Available Over the last few years, topics of displaying, presentation, lighting, energy saving and issues related to the environment while selling the fresh food (fruits, vegetable, bakery products, meat are becoming an important matter among traders. However, just bigger companies with transnational capital have devoted their attention to this issue yet. Generally, the energy costs make up 70% of operating costs in retail stores where the cooling system and lighting are the most energy consuming. Accent lighting in modern retails is largely involved in the overall design and atmosphere in shops and plays a crucial role in presenting the goods as well. Using of accent lighting can draw the customer's attention to a specific part of the sales area and achieve the overall harmonization in the store. With the rational using of combination of energy saving and effective accent lighting retailers can achieve not only attractive presentation of displayed products but also appreciable savings in the operation of their stores. It is the only factor that can be exactly measured and controlled. Using a Colour and Lux Meters we found out the intensity and color temperature of accent lighting used in domestic and foreign retail chains for the different kinds of fresh food products. Based on the obtained values we have compiled graphs, which are showing visual comfort. We also identified different types of accent lighting, which we assigned to their impact on emotional involvement of consumers. The starting points were the tests we conducted in simulated laboratory conditions. While searching of a compromise between effective and energy efficient accent lighting we take into consideration consumers' emotional response as well as the annual electricity consumption of different types of light sources. At the end we recommend options for energy-efficient, effective and spectacular lighting while using the optimal number of light sources and their logical organization
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Memory Function in Feeding Habit Transformation of Mandarin Fish (Siniperca chuatsi).
Dou, Yaqi; He, Shan; Liang, Xu-Fang; Cai, Wenjing; Wang, Jie; Shi, Linjie; Li, Jiao
2018-04-22
Mandarin fish refuse dead prey fish or artificial diets and can be trained to transform their inborn feeding habit. To investigate the effect of memory on feeding habit transformation, we compared the reaction time to dead prey fish and the success rate of feeding habit transformation to dead prey fish with training of mandarin fish in the 1st experimental group (trained once) and the 2nd experimental group (trained twice). The mandarin fish in the 2nd group had higher success rate of feeding habit transformation (100%) than those in the 1st group (67%), and shorter reaction time to dead prey fish (1 s). Gene expression of cAMP responsive element binding protein I ( Creb I ), brain-derived neurotrophic factor ( Bdnf ), CCAAT enhancer binding protein delta ( C/EBPD ), fos-related antigen 2 ( Fra2 ), and proto-oncogenes c-fos ( c-fos ) involved in long-term memory formation were significantly increased in the 2nd group after repeated training, and taste 1 receptor member 1 ( T1R1 ), involved in feeding habit formation, was significantly increased in brains of the 2nd group after repeated training. DNA methylation levels at five candidate CpG (cytosine⁻guanine) sites contained in the predicted CpG island in the 5′-flanking region of T1R1 were significantly decreased in brains of the 2nd group compared with that of the 1st group. These results indicated that the repeated training can improve the feeding habit transformation through the memory formation of accepting dead prey fish. DNA methylation of the T1R1 might be a regulatory factor for feeding habit transformation from live prey fish to dead prey fish in mandarin fish.
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Memory Function in Feeding Habit Transformation of Mandarin Fish (Siniperca chuatsi
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Yaqi Dou
2018-04-01
Full Text Available Mandarin fish refuse dead prey fish or artificial diets and can be trained to transform their inborn feeding habit. To investigate the effect of memory on feeding habit transformation, we compared the reaction time to dead prey fish and the success rate of feeding habit transformation to dead prey fish with training of mandarin fish in the 1st experimental group (trained once and the 2nd experimental group (trained twice. The mandarin fish in the 2nd group had higher success rate of feeding habit transformation (100% than those in the 1st group (67%, and shorter reaction time to dead prey fish (<1 s than those in the 1st group (>1 s. Gene expression of cAMP responsive element binding protein I (Creb I, brain-derived neurotrophic factor (Bdnf, CCAAT enhancer binding protein delta (C/EBPD, fos-related antigen 2 (Fra2, and proto-oncogenes c-fos (c-fos involved in long-term memory formation were significantly increased in the 2nd group after repeated training, and taste 1 receptor member 1 (T1R1, involved in feeding habit formation, was significantly increased in brains of the 2nd group after repeated training. DNA methylation levels at five candidate CpG (cytosine–guanine sites contained in the predicted CpG island in the 5′-flanking region of T1R1 were significantly decreased in brains of the 2nd group compared with that of the 1st group. These results indicated that the repeated training can improve the feeding habit transformation through the memory formation of accepting dead prey fish. DNA methylation of the T1R1 might be a regulatory factor for feeding habit transformation from live prey fish to dead prey fish in mandarin fish.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Nuning Catur Sri Wilujeng
2015-09-01
Full Text Available This study was aimed to investigate 1 the improvement of CFL elementary-school students’ skill in learning Mandarin Chinese (hereafter referred to as Mandarin vocabulary through creating comic without online resources, creating online comics individually and collaboratively, 2 the CFL elementary-school students’ attitude towards the application of comics in learning Mandarin vocabulary, and 3 the CFL elementary-school students’ attitude towards the application of collaborative activities in learning Mandarin vocabulary. The research design was based on a quasi-experiment using both qualitative and quantitative approaches. Three classes participated in this study: one class was the control group using text-based instruction without online resources; the other two classes were the experimental groups 1 and 2. In the experimental group 1, students worked individually on online comic whereas in the experimental group 2, students worked collaboratively on online comic. All participants were Grade 5 students of Budi Utama Multilingual School in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. The collected and analyzed data included performances on Mandarin vocabulary, in-class observation, questionnaires, and interview. In Mandarin vocabulary performances, the experimental group 2 outperformed the other two groups and the experimental group 1 performed better than the control group. In the students’ attitude, the experimental group 2 behaved more positively than the two other groups, and the control group behaved more positively than the experimental group 1.
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Accent, Identity, and a Fear of Loss? ESL Students' Perspectives
McCrocklin, Shannon; Link, Stephanie
2016-01-01
Because many theorists propose a connection between accent and identity, some theorists have justifiably been concerned about the ethical ramifications of L2 pronunciation teaching. However, English-as-a-second-language (ESL) students often state a desire to sound like native speakers. With little research into ESL students' perceptions of links…
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Mandarin, Suzhou Dialect and English: Multilingualism in Suzhou
Xu, Sibing
2015-01-01
This paper explains the situation of Mandarin, Suzhou dialect and English in Suzhou, the relation between language policy and language use, discusses the positive and negative consequences that multilingualism in Suzhou might have for the society, and focuses on the change of language use in Suzhou and provides suggestions for the maintenance of…
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A comparison of sensory-motor activity during speech in first and second languages.
Simmonds, Anna J; Wise, Richard J S; Dhanjal, Novraj S; Leech, Robert
2011-07-01
A foreign language (L2) learned after childhood results in an accent. This functional neuroimaging study investigated speech in L2 as a sensory-motor skill. The hypothesis was that there would be an altered response in auditory and somatosensory association cortex, specifically the planum temporale and parietal operculum, respectively, when speaking in L2 relative to L1, independent of rate of speaking. These regions were selected for three reasons. First, an influential computational model proposes that these cortices integrate predictive feedforward and postarticulatory sensory feedback signals during articulation. Second, these adjacent regions (known as Spt) have been identified as a "sensory-motor interface" for speech production. Third, probabilistic anatomical atlases exist for these regions, to ensure the analyses are confined to sensory-motor differences between L2 and L1. The study used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), and participants produced connected overt speech. The first hypothesis was that there would be greater activity in the planum temporale and the parietal operculum when subjects spoke in L2 compared with L1, one interpretation being that there is less efficient postarticulatory sensory monitoring when speaking in the less familiar L2. The second hypothesis was that this effect would be observed in both cerebral hemispheres. Although Spt is considered to be left-lateralized, this is based on studies of covert speech, whereas overt speech is accompanied by sensory feedback to bilateral auditory and somatosensory cortices. Both hypotheses were confirmed by the results. These findings provide the basis for future investigations of sensory-motor aspects of language learning using serial fMRI studies.
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Wilujeng, Nuning Catur Sri; Lan, Yu-Ju
2015-01-01
This study was aimed to investigate (1) the improvement of CFL elementary-school students' skill in learning Mandarin Chinese (hereafter referred to as Mandarin) vocabulary through creating comic without online resources, creating online comics individually and collaboratively; (2) the CFL elementary-school students' attitude towards the…
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Lacroix Mylène
2017-12-01
Full Text Available The Merry Wives of Windsor has long been compared to a great babel of languages. The play contains a smattering of Spanish, Italian and Dutch and even a whole scene dedicated to the mistranslation of Latin. A large part of the play’s humour also heavily relies on the foreign accents of two characters: the French Doctor Caius and the Welsh parson Sir Hugh Evans. If Christopher Luscombe’s 2008/2010 production of The Merry Wives at Shakespeare’s Globe theatre in London bears testimony to the success of cross-language and accent-based comedy as a source of laughter on today’s English stage, it seems rather implausible, at first sight, that French translations, adaptations and stagings of these accents and linguistic idiosyncrasies should be greeted with the same degree of hilarity. Indeed, how should the Welsh and French accents, both representing real stumbling blocks for French-speaking translators of the play, be transposed into French? What translation strategies can the latter devise? And to what extent can some of those strategies be said to be politically correct? Focusing on Shakespeare’s ‘favorite’ (predominant accents and the significance and impact of such linguistic comedy, I shall examine the question of their problematic translation through the analysis and comparison of a number of translations and stagings of The Merry Wives of Windsor into French.
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The Effect of Vocal Training Methods on Improving Turkish Accent Defects
Aycan, Kivanc; Evren, Gul Fahriye
2016-01-01
Problem Statement: Despite analyses of how vocal training methods can correct or improve Turkish-language accent defects, for most voice educators, the most important methods continue to be breathe management control and correct vocalization exercises. We therefore sought to demonstrate the relationship of song lyrics to breathe control, accent…
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In recent years, an emerging, undescribed postharvest fruit rot disease was observed on mandarin fruit after extended storage in California. We collected decayed mandarin fruit from three citrus packinghouses in the Central Valley of California in 2015 and identified this disease as Mucor rot caused...
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Ren, Yonggang; Rattanasone, Nan Xu; Wyver, Shirley; Hinton, Amber; Demuth, Katherine
2016-01-01
We investigated typical errors made by Mandarin-speaking children when measured by the Preschool Language Scales-fifth edition, Screening Test (PLS-5 Screening Test). The intention was to provide preliminary data for the development of a guideline for early childhood educators and psychologists who use the test with Mandarin-speaking children.…
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Dancy mandarin: a new alternative for citrus growing in the piedmont plains of Colombia
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Diana Mateus Cagua
2015-01-01
Full Text Available The major citrus production of the world are located between 20-40 degrees north and south latitude. In these conditions the mandarins get the best internal and external qualities. ‘Arrayana’ is the main mandarin cultivated in Colombia tropical lowlands (around 04° N. This variety is characterized by a high concentration of the harvest in december and january because it has only one principal bloom in the year (two weeks after onset of rainy season; and an average external quality that prevents it from being highly competitive. Both conditions reduce the profitability of citrus growers in the region. In order to identify and develop mandarin genotypes who obtain outstanding qualities in tropical lowlands, was evaluated at Corpoica La Libertad Research Center (Villavicencio, Meta the Dancy variety since 2000 (Citrus reticulata Blanco var. Dancy for vegetative growth, fruit yield, quality and consumer acceptance through a hedonic test. This information was compared with that obtained in experimental field of Arrayana tangerine; both were grafted on ‘Cleopatra’ mandarin rootstock (Citrus reshni hort. ex Tanaka. The outstanding fruit quality of Dancy (TSS: 10,8; TSS/TA ratio: 18,1; fruit weight: 145,85 g and high cumulative production confirms the adaptation of the variety to the conditions of the Foothills of Meta department; while good consumer acceptance, suggests its recommendation to be established as complementary to the Arrayana’s production. The evaluated clone is susceptible to Alternaria which may limit its cultivation in tropical medium lands conditions where the rainfall regime is bimodal and relative humidity can be high.
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Acquisition of mental state language in Mandarin- and Cantonese-speaking children.
Tardif, T; Wellman, H M
2000-01-01
Children's theory of mind appears to develop from a focus on desire to a focus on belief. However, it is not clear (a) whether this pattern is universal and (b) whether it could also be explained by linguistic and sociocultural factors. This study examined mental state language in 10 Mandarin-speaking (21-27 months) and 8 Cantonese-speaking (18-44 months) toddlers. The results suggest a pattern of theory-of-mind development similar to that in English, with early use of desire terms followed by other mental state references. However, the Chinese-speaking children used desire terms much earlier, and the use of terms for thinking was very infrequent, even for Mandarin-speaking adults. This finding suggests a consistency in the overall sequence, but variation in the timing of beginning and end points, in children's theory-of-mind development across cultures.
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The role of planum temporale in processing accent variation in spoken language comprehension.
Adank, P.M.; Noordzij, M.L.; Hagoort, P.
2012-01-01
A repetitionsuppression functional magnetic resonance imaging paradigm was used to explore the neuroanatomical substrates of processing two types of acoustic variationspeaker and accentduring spoken sentence comprehension. Recordings were made for two speakers and two accents: Standard Dutch and a
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The role of planum temporale in processing accent variation in spoken language comprehension
Adank, P.M.; Noordzij, M.L.; Hagoort, P.
2012-01-01
A repetition–suppression functional magnetic resonance imaging paradigm was used to explore the neuroanatomical substrates of processing two types of acoustic variation—speaker and accent—during spoken sentence comprehension. Recordings were made for two speakers and two accents: Standard Dutch and
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Speech Analysis and Visual Image: Language Learning
Loo, Alfred; Chung, C. W.; Lam, Alan
2016-01-01
Students will speak a second language with an accent if they learn the language after the age of six. It does not matter how motivated and clever they are, the accent will not go away. Only a few gifted students can speak a second language flawlessly. The exact reasons for this phenomenon are unknown. Although a large number of hypotheses have…
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Jia, Rui; Tai, Fadao; An, Shucheng; Zhang, Xia; Broders, Hugh
2009-11-01
This study examined whether neonatal paternal deprivation (PD: father was removed and pups were raised just by mother) or early deprivation (ED: pups were raised by both parents except separated from not only the dam but also the peers for three hours a day from PND 0 to 13) has long-term effects on anxiety and social behaviors of adult mandarin voles. Newborn mandarin voles of F2 generation were randomly assigned to one of three groups: bi-parental care (PC: pups were raised by both parents), PD and ED. The parental care behaviors of F1 generation were observed at the age of 0, 13 and 21 days (PND 0, 13, 21) of F2 generation of PC and PD groups. Moreover, each mandarin vole of F2 generation received an open field test and a social interaction test on PND 70 and PND 75, respectively. No significant differences of parental behavior were observed between mothers and fathers from PC families, showing typical parental behavior of socially monogamous rodents. In addition, no significant differences of maternal behaviors were found between mothers from PC and PD families, indicating no maternal compensation towards pups for the absence of the paternal care. In the open field test, mandarin voles from both PD and ED families displayed higher levels of anxiety and lower locomotor activity, relative to offspring of PC family. In the social interaction test, both PD and ED mandarin voles also showed lower levels of social behavior and higher levels of anxiety. Thus, both PD and ED significantly increase anxiety and reduce social behavior of adult mandarin voles, suggesting that variation in parental investment may lead to variation in anxiety and social behaviors in rodents with different mating systems.
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S¯adhan¯a Vol. 27, 2002 Subject Index
Indian Academy of Sciences (India)
R. Narasimhan (Krishtel eMaging) 1461 1996 Oct 15 13:05:22
Indian accent text-to-speech system for web browsing. 113. Hydraulics. Hydraulics of fee overfall in A-shaped chan- nels. 353. Hydrodynamic instability. A generalized biharmonic equation and its applications to hydrodynamic instability 309. Incipient motion. Incipient motion of gravel and coal bed 559. Indian accent.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Inna A. Khyzhnyak
2016-02-01
Full Text Available The article reveals the problems of primary school teachers professional activity under the conditions of education informatization, gives the general characteristic of e-linguomethodology’s researches directions as an innovative area of methodology science, argues the necessity of general classification of e-linguomethodology’s genres for primary school, presents an analysis of existing research on the topic, summarizes their results on the electronic books as a genre of educational software. The author substantiates her own classification of e-linguomethodology’s means for primary school, accents attention on importance of their system use in an educational process, pays special attention to psychological and pedagogical, methodical and technical requirements to electronic textbooks on language and speech development.
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Dissimilation in the Second Language Acquisition of Mandarin Chinese Tones
Zhang, Hang
2016-01-01
This article extends Optimality Theoretic studies to the research on second language tone phonology. Specifically, this work analyses the acquisition of identical tone sequences in Mandarin Chinese by adult speakers of three non-tonal languages: English, Japanese and Korean. This study finds that the learners prefer not to use identical lexical…
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Het poëtisch accent. Drie literaire genres in zeventiende-eeuwse Nederlandse pamfletten
Vrieler, J.A.
2007-01-01
'The poetic accent. Three literary genres in seventeenth-century Dutch pamphlets' focuses on the way the conviction works, by studying pamphlets containing sonnets, songs and echo-poetry. I distinguish between structural and affective functions of poetry. Within the composition of a pamphlet, poetry
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Liu, Yuying; Dong, Ruijuan; Li, Yuling; Xu, Tianqiu; Li, Yongxin; Chen, Xueqing; Gong, Shusheng
2014-12-01
To evaluate the auditory and speech abilities in children with auditory neuropathy spectrum disorder (ANSD) after cochlear implantation (CI) and determine the role of age at implantation. Ten children participated in this retrospective case series study. All children had evidence of ANSD. All subjects had no cochlear nerve deficiency on magnetic resonance imaging and had used the cochlear implants for a period of 12-84 months. We divided our children into two groups: children who underwent implantation before 24 months of age and children who underwent implantation after 24 months of age. Their auditory and speech abilities were evaluated using the following: behavioral audiometry, the Categories of Auditory Performance (CAP), the Meaningful Auditory Integration Scale (MAIS), the Infant-Toddler Meaningful Auditory Integration Scale (IT-MAIS), the Standard-Chinese version of the Monosyllabic Lexical Neighborhood Test (LNT), the Multisyllabic Lexical Neighborhood Test (MLNT), the Speech Intelligibility Rating (SIR) and the Meaningful Use of Speech Scale (MUSS). All children showed progress in their auditory and language abilities. The 4-frequency average hearing level (HL) (500Hz, 1000Hz, 2000Hz and 4000Hz) of aided hearing thresholds ranged from 17.5 to 57.5dB HL. All children developed time-related auditory perception and speech skills. Scores of children with ANSD who received cochlear implants before 24 months tended to be better than those of children who received cochlear implants after 24 months. Seven children completed the Mandarin Lexical Neighborhood Test. Approximately half of the children showed improved open-set speech recognition. Cochlear implantation is helpful for children with ANSD and may be a good optional treatment for many ANSD children. In addition, children with ANSD fitted with cochlear implants before 24 months tended to acquire auditory and speech skills better than children fitted with cochlear implants after 24 months. Copyright © 2014
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Functional MRI of Conventional and Anomalous Metaphors in Mandarin Chinese
Ahrens, Kathleen; Liu, Ho-Ling; Lee, Chia-Ying; Gong, Shu-Ping; Fang, Shin-Yi; Hsu, Yuan-Yu
2007-01-01
This study looks at whether conventional and anomalous metaphors are processed in different locations in the brain while being read when compared with a literal condition in Mandarin Chinese. We find that conventional metaphors differ from the literal condition with a slight amount of increased activation in the right inferior temporal gyrus. In…
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Using Bona Adaptation to Improve Accent Defects as a Voice Training Method
Aycan, Kivanc
2017-01-01
Purpose: In this research, it is observed that if solfeggio syllables, consonants, and vowels are spoken properly, voice intensity (accent), duration, pitch (high pitch-low pitch) and intonation (the ability to carry a musical voice) related to proper pitch level. In this study, it is observed that rhythmic structures do not form without…
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2013-08-15
...-Speech Services for Individuals with Hearing and Speech Disabilities, Report and Order (Order), document...] Speech-to-Speech and Internet Protocol (IP) Speech-to-Speech Telecommunications Relay Services; Telecommunications Relay Services and Speech-to-Speech Services for Individuals With Hearing and Speech Disabilities...
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Luo, Xia; Fu, Xiaozhe; Liao, Guoli; Chang, Ouqin; Huang, Zhibin; Li, Ningqiu
2017-06-01
In recent years, mandarin fish had a high mortality rate associated with abnormal swimming, exophthalmia, corneal opacity and eye hemorrhage on a fish farm located at Foshan city, Guangdong province, China. Three isolates of Gram-positive, chain-forming cocci were recovered from moribund fish, and designated as SS131025-1, SS131025-2, and SS131025-3. These isolates were identified as Streptococcus uberis according to their morphologic and physio-biochemical characteristics as well as phylogenetic analysis based on their 16S rRNA and GapC gene sequences. The pathogenicity of S. uberis to mandarin fish was determined by challenge experiments. Results of artificial challenge showed S. uberis infected healthy mandarin fish and lead to death by eyeball injection or immersion route, and the LD 50 of SS131025-1 with eyeball injection was 2.0 × 10 6.42 CFU per fish. Moreover extracellular product (ECP) of the isolated S.uberis induced CPB cell apoptosis and cause death of mandarin fish. In addition, these S. uberis strains could also infect tilapia, but not grass carp and crucian carp, and grew in brain-heart infusion broth with an optimal temperature of 37 °C, pH of 7.0, and salinity of 0%. Antibiotic sensitivity testing indicated that these isolates were susceptible to rifampicin and furazolidone but resistant to 20 kinds of antibiotics. Histopathologically, infection with S. uberis could cause serious pathological changes in brain tissues such as vacuoles in matrix, swollen mitochondria with lysis of cristae and disintegration, and lots of coccus was observed both under electron and light microscope. These results shed some light on the pathogenicity of the isolates and how to prevent and control S. uberis infection in mandarin fish. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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STATE-OF-THE-ART TASKS AND ACHIEVEMENTS OF PARALINGUISTIC SPEECH ANALYSIS SYSTEMS
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
A. A. Karpov
2016-07-01
Full Text Available We present analytical survey of state-of-the-art actual tasks in the area of computational paralinguistics, as well as the recent achievements of automatic systems for paralinguistic analysis of conversational speech. Paralinguistics studies non-verbal aspects of human communication and speech such as: natural emotions, accents, psycho-physiological states, pronunciation features, speaker’s voice parameters, etc. We describe architecture of a baseline computer system for acoustical paralinguistic analysis, its main components and useful speech processing methods. We present some information on an International contest called Computational Paralinguistics Challenge (ComParE, which is held each year since 2009 in the framework of the International conference INTERSPEECH organized by the International Speech Communication Association. We present sub-challenges (tasks that were proposed at the ComParE Challenges in 2009-2016, and analyze winning computer systems for each sub-challenge and obtained results. The last completed ComParE-2015 Challenge was organized in September 2015 in Germany and proposed 3 sub-challenges: 1 Degree of Nativeness (DN sub-challenge, determination of nativeness degree of speakers based on acoustics; 2 Parkinson's Condition (PC sub-challenge, recognition of a degree of Parkinson’s condition based on speech analysis; 3 Eating Condition (EC sub-challenge, determination of the eating condition state during speaking or a dialogue, and classification of consumed food type (one of seven classes of food by the speaker. In the last sub-challenge (EC, the winner was a joint Turkish-Russian team consisting of the authors of the given paper. We have developed the most efficient computer-based system for detection and classification of the corresponding (EC acoustical paralinguistic events. The paper deals with the architecture of this system, its main modules and methods, as well as the description of used training and evaluation
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The Acquisition of English Focus Marking by Non-Native Speakers
Baker, Rachel Elizabeth
This dissertation examines Mandarin and Korean speakers' acquisition of English focus marking, which is realized by accenting particular words within a focused constituent. It is important for non-native speakers to learn how accent placement relates to focus in English because appropriate accent placement and realization makes a learner's English more native-like and easier to understand. Such knowledge may also improve their English comprehension skills. In this study, 20 native English speakers, 20 native Mandarin speakers, and 20 native Korean speakers participated in four experiments: (1) a production experiment, in which they were recorded reading the answers to questions, (2) a perception experiment, in which they were asked to determine which word in a recording was the last prominent word, (3) an understanding experiment, in which they were asked whether the answers in recorded question-answer pairs had context-appropriate prosody, and (4) an accent placement experiment, in which they were asked which word they would make prominent in a particular context. Finally, a new group of native English speakers listened to utterances produced in the production experiment, and determined whether the prosody of each utterance was appropriate for its context. The results of the five experiments support a novel predictive model for second language prosodic focus marking acquisition. This model holds that both transfer of linguistic features from a learner's native language (L1) and features of their second language (L2) affect learners' acquisition of prosodic focus marking. As a result, the model includes two complementary components: the Transfer Component and the L2 Challenge Component. The Transfer Component predicts that prosodic structures in the L2 will be more easily acquired by language learners that have similar structures in their L1 than those who do not, even if there are differences between the L1 and L2 in how the structures are realized. The L2
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International Nuclear Information System (INIS)
McLauchlan, R.L.; Brown, B.I.; Mitchell, G.E.; Aston, J.W.; Wood, A.F.; Isaacs, A.R.; Williams, S.M.; Nottingham, S.M.; Wilson, P.R.; Juffs, H.S.; Johnson, G.I.; Heather, N.W.; Giles, J.E.; Wills, P.A.
1988-01-01
Two trials are described on the effect of ionising energy treatment, or irradiation, on the quality, shelf-life and composition of fresh produce, mainly at doses consistent with disinfestation treatment for quarantine purposes. Trial 1, carried out in May 1987, deals with replicated treatments of Imperial mandarins and preliminary observation treatments on a range of other produce. Trial 2 deals with replicated treatments of Ellendale mandarins and preliminary observation treatments on other produce
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An Introspective Study of Arabic- and Mandarin-Speakers' Reading Comprehension Strategies
Abbott, Marilyn
2010-01-01
Little L2 reading strategy research has explored the effect of linguistic and cross-cultural differences on strategic reading habits. This study attempted to fill this void by examining the reading strategies that Arabic- and Mandarin-speaking immigrants employed when reading and answering Canadian Language Benchmarks Assessment reading…
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Liu, Xiang-Yu; Li, Juan; Liu, Meng-Meng; Yao, Qing; Chen, Jie-Zhong
2017-01-01
To obtain insight into potential mechanisms underlying the influence of rootstock on scion growth, we performed a comparative analysis of 'Shatangju' mandarin grafted onto 5 rootstocks: Fragrant orange (Citrus junons Sieb. ex. Tanaka), Red tangerine (Citrus reticulata Blanco), 'Shatangju' mandarin (Citrus reticulata Blanco), Rough lemon (Citrus jambhiri Lush) and Canton lemon (Citrus limonia Osbeck). The tree size of 'Shatangju' mandarin grafted onto Canton lemon and Rough lemon were the largest, followed by self-rooted rootstock trees, and the lowest tree sizes correspond to ones grafted on Red tangerine and Fragrant orange rootstocks. The levels of indoleacetic acid (IAA) and gibberellin (GA) were significantly and positively related to growth vigor. The differences of gene expression in leaves of trees grafted onto Red tangerine, Canton lemon and 'Shatangju' mandarin were analyzed by RNA-Seq. Results showed that more differentially expressed genes involved in oxidoreductase function, hormonal signal transduction and the glycolytic pathway were enriched in 'Red tangerine vs Canton lemon'. qRT-PCR analysis showed that expression levels of ARF1, ARF8, GH3 and IAA4 were negatively correlated with the growth vigor and IAA content. The metabolism of GA was influenced by the differential expression of KO1 and GA2OX1 in grafted trees. In addition, most of antioxidant enzyme genes were up-regulated in leaves of trees grafted onto Red tangerine, resulting in a higher peroxidase activity. We concluded that different rootstocks significantly affected the expression of genes involved in auxin signal transduction pathway and GA biosynthesis pathway in the grafted plants, and then regulated the hormone levels and their signal pathways.
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Reliability and validity of the Chinese mandarin version of PedsQL™ 3.0 transplant module.
Chang, Ying; Luo, Yanhui; Zhou, Yuchen; Wang, Ruixin; Song, Na; Zhu, Guanghua; Wang, Bin; Qin, Maoquan; Yang, Jun; Sun, Yuan; Li, Chunfu; Zhou, Xuan
2016-10-05
Long-term health-related quality of life (HRQoL) of pediatric patients after hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) is increasingly studied worldwide. However, few studies have been performed in China, where no uniform scale is available; the PedsQL™ Cancer Module 3.0 Chinese Mandarin version has been used to evaluate HRQoL of patients after HSCT in China. This study aimed to assess the reliability and validity of the Chinese Mandarin version of PedsQL™ 3.0 Transplant Module. Patients between 2 and 18 years old, who underwent HSCT from January 2006 to June 2014, were recruited in Beijing Children's Hospital affiliated to Capital Medical University, the First Affiliated Hospital of Southern Medical University and Beijing Daopei Hospital. 207 parent reports and 182 child self-reports of the PedsQL™ 3.0 Transplant Module Chinese Mandarin version were assigned, of which 362 were returned. No missing item response was observed in the returned reports. Cronbach's alpha coefficient exceeded 0.7 in total scale and every dimension. The intraclass correlation coefficient exceeded 0.8 in all dimensions of child self-reports and parent reports. Spearman's rank correlation coefficients of items and their respective dimensions were 0.6-0.94 in parent reports, and 0.62-0.93 in child self-reports, while a weak association was found between the items and other dimensions. Exploratory factor analysis indicated a good extraction effect, and construct validity of the scale was >60 %. The Chinese Mandarin version of PedsQL™ 3.0 Transplant Module has good feasibility, reliability and validity. Its use may help improve the HRQoL of children after HSCT in China.
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Speech-to-Speech Relay Service
Consumer Guide Speech to Speech Relay Service Speech-to-Speech (STS) is one form of Telecommunications Relay Service (TRS). TRS is a service that allows persons with hearing and speech disabilities ...
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L1 Korean and L1 Mandarin L2 English Learners' Acquisition of the Count/Mass Distinction in English
Choi, Sea Hee; Ionin, Tania; Zhu, Yeqiu
2018-01-01
This study investigates the second language (L2) acquisition of the English count/mass distinction by speakers of Korean and Mandarin Chinese, with a focus on the semantics of atomicity. It is hypothesized that L1-Korean and L1-Mandarin L2-English learners are influenced by atomicity in the use of the count/mass morphosyntax in English. This…
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A Short note on Accent–bias, Social Identity and Ethnocentrism
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Rahul Chakraborty
2017-08-01
Full Text Available This paper discusses the interrelations among accent-based biases, social identity and ethnocentrism. Construction of social identity creates a set of ethnocentric values within a person, which indirectly or directly plays a pivotal role in generating accent related biases. Starting with Tajfel’s (1959 social identity theory and then the discussion of ethnocentrism, accent related biases have a long documented origin, development and consequences. People construct their social identity based on numerous variables and then their in-group and out-group memberships are established. Ethnocentrism, as a variable, influences listeners’ accent perception and subsequent judgment regarding their perceived accent. The degree of ethnocentrism is related to speakers’ potential accent biases. As legal safeguard against accent related biases is absent, active resistance and awareness-initiation are expected from speech language pathologists and the concerned community in general. Role of training institutions is discussed.
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Corre, Mathieu Le; Li, Peggy; Huang, Becky H.; Jia, Gisela; Carey, Susan
2016-01-01
Previous studies showed that children learning a language with an obligatory singular/plural distinction (Russian and English) learn the meaning of the number word for one earlier than children learning Japanese, a language without obligatory number morphology (Barner, Libenson, Cheung, & Takasaki, 2009; Sarnecka, Kamenskaya, Yamana, Ogura, & Yudovina, 2007). This can be explained by differences in number morphology, but it can also be explained by many other differences between the languages and the environments of the children who were compared. The present study tests the hypothesis that the morphological singular/plural distinction supports the early acquisition of the meaning of the number word for one by comparing young English learners to age and SES matched young Mandarin Chinese learners. Mandarin does not have obligatory number morphology but is more similar to English than Japanese in many crucial respects. Corpus analyses show that, compared to English learners, Mandarin learners hear number words more frequently, are more likely to hear number words followed by a noun, and are more likely to hear number words in contexts where they denote a cardinal value. Two tasks show that, despite these advantages, Mandarin learners learn the meaning of the number word for one three to six months later than do English learners. These results provide the strongest evidence to date that prior knowledge of the numerical meaning of the distinction between singular and plural supports the acquisition of the meaning of the number word for one. PMID:27423486
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Le Corre, Mathieu; Li, Peggy; Huang, Becky H; Jia, Gisela; Carey, Susan
2016-08-01
Previous studies showed that children learning a language with an obligatory singular/plural distinction (Russian and English) learn the meaning of the number word for one earlier than children learning Japanese, a language without obligatory number morphology (Barner, Libenson, Cheung, & Takasaki, 2009; Sarnecka, Kamenskaya, Yamana, Ogura, & Yudovina, 2007). This can be explained by differences in number morphology, but it can also be explained by many other differences between the languages and the environments of the children who were compared. The present study tests the hypothesis that the morphological singular/plural distinction supports the early acquisition of the meaning of the number word for one by comparing young English learners to age and SES matched young Mandarin Chinese learners. Mandarin does not have obligatory number morphology but is more similar to English than Japanese in many crucial respects. Corpus analyses show that, compared to English learners, Mandarin learners hear number words more frequently, are more likely to hear number words followed by a noun, and are more likely to hear number words in contexts where they denote a cardinal value. Two tasks show that, despite these advantages, Mandarin learners learn the meaning of the number word for one three to six months later than do English learners. These results provide the strongest evidence to date that prior knowledge of the numerical meaning of the distinction between singular and plural supports the acquisition of the meaning of the number word for one. Copyright © 2016. Published by Elsevier Inc.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Ying Yang
2015-01-01
Conclusions: The data suggested the early hearing intervention and home-based habilitation benefit auditory and speech development. Chronological age and recovery time may be major factors for aural verbal outcomes in hearing impaired children. The development of auditory and speech in hearing impaired children may be relatively crucial in thefirst year's habilitation after fitted with the auxiliary device.
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Wang, Jie; Wong, Andus Wing-Kuen; Chen, Hsuan-Chih
2017-06-05
The time course of phonological encoding in Mandarin monosyllabic word production was investigated by using the picture-word interference paradigm. Participants were asked to name pictures in Mandarin while visual distractor words were presented before, at, or after picture onset (i.e., stimulus-onset asynchrony/SOA = -100, 0, or +100 ms, respectively). Compared with the unrelated control, the distractors sharing atonal syllables with the picture names significantly facilitated the naming responses at -100- and 0-ms SOAs. In addition, the facilitation effect of sharing word-initial segments only appeared at 0-ms SOA, and null effects were found for sharing word-final segments. These results indicate that both syllables and subsyllabic units play important roles in Mandarin spoken word production and more critically that syllabic processing precedes subsyllabic processing. The current results lend strong support to the proximate units principle (O'Seaghdha, Chen, & Chen, 2010), which holds that the phonological structure of spoken word production is language-specific and that atonal syllables are the proximate phonological units in Mandarin Chinese. On the other hand, the significance of word-initial segments over word-final segments suggests that serial processing of segmental information seems to be universal across Germanic languages and Chinese, which remains to be verified in future studies.
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Accent imitation positively affects language attitudes
Adank, Patti; Stewart, Andrew J.; Connell, Louise; Wood, Jeffrey
2013-01-01
People in conversation tend to accommodate the way they speak. It has been assumed that this tendency to imitate each other's speech patterns serves to increase liking between partners in a conversation. Previous experiments examined the effect of perceived social attractiveness on the tendency to imitate someone else's speech and found that vocal imitation increased when perceived attractiveness was higher. The present experiment extends this research by examining the inverse relationship an...
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Accent Imitation Positively Affects Language Attitudes
Patti eAdank; Patti eAdank; Andrew J. Stewart; Louise eConnell; Jeffrey eWood
2013-01-01
People in conversation tend to accommodate the way they speak. It has been assumed that this tendency to imitate each other’s speech patterns serves to increase liking between partners in a conversation. Previous experiments examined the effect of perceived social attractiveness on the tendency to imitate someone else’s speech and found that vocal imitation increased when perceived attractiveness was higher. The present experiment extends this research by examining the inverse relationship an...
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Second Language Acquisition of Mandarin Chinese Vocabulary: Context of Learning Effects
Lan, Yu-Ju; Fang, Shin-Yi; Legault, Jennifer; Li, Ping
2015-01-01
In an increasingly multilingual world, it is important to examine methods that may lead to more efficient second language learning, as well as to analyze the mechanisms by which successful learning occurs. The purpose of the current study was to investigate how different learning contexts can impact the learning of Mandarin Chinese as a second…
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Qiao, Xufeng; Yan, Yating; Wu, Ruiyong; Tai, Fadao; Hao, Ping; Cao, Yan; Wang, Jianli
2014-02-01
The dominant-subordinate hierarchy in animals often needs to be established via agonistic encounters and consequently affects reproduction and survival. Differences in brain neuropeptides and sociality among dominant and subordinate males and females remain poorly understood. Here we explore neuropeptide levels and sociality during agonistic encounter tests in mandarin voles. We found that dominant mandarin voles engaged in higher levels of approaching, investigating, self-grooming and exploring behavior than subordinates. Dominant males habituated better to a stimulus vole than dominant females. Dominant males displayed significantly less oxytocin-immunoreactive neurons in the paraventricular nuclei and more vasopressin-immunoreactive neurons in the paraventricular nuclei, supraoptic nuclei, and the lateral and anterior hypothalamus than subordinates. Dominant females displayed significantly more vasopressin-immunoreactive neurons in the lateral hypothalamus and anterior hypothalamus than subordinates. Sex differences were found in the level of oxytocin and vasopressin. These results indicate that distinct parameters related to central nervous oxytocin and vasopressin are associated with behaviors during agonistic encounters in a sex-specific manner in mandarin voles.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Rizky Wardhani
2015-07-01
Full Text Available This research focused on the study on the development of teaching materials using the instructional media card with a picture in a book “Hanyu Tingli Jiaocheng” especially vocabulary as supporting the learning process. The choosing of appropriate learning media supported the teaching-learning process. The choosing of the media must be done carefully using many considerations to achieve the target of learning in facilitating the learners. This research was conducted on the Mandarin Listening I and II. Approproate teaching materials are needed to support teachers who teach this course. This study used qualitative research. The research was done in the Basic Class I and Basic Class II. The result showed that the Mandarin students got new concept for Mandarin learning process.
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Liu, Meng-Meng; Yao, Qing; Chen, Jie-Zhong
2017-01-01
To obtain insight into potential mechanisms underlying the influence of rootstock on scion growth, we performed a comparative analysis of ‘Shatangju’ mandarin grafted onto 5 rootstocks: Fragrant orange (Citrus junons Sieb. ex. Tanaka), Red tangerine (Citrus reticulata Blanco), ‘Shatangju’ mandarin (Citrus reticulata Blanco), Rough lemon (Citrus jambhiri Lush) and Canton lemon (Citrus limonia Osbeck). The tree size of ‘Shatangju’ mandarin grafted onto Canton lemon and Rough lemon were the largest, followed by self-rooted rootstock trees, and the lowest tree sizes correspond to ones grafted on Red tangerine and Fragrant orange rootstocks. The levels of indoleacetic acid (IAA) and gibberellin (GA) were significantly and positively related to growth vigor. The differences of gene expression in leaves of trees grafted onto Red tangerine, Canton lemon and ‘Shatangju’ mandarin were analyzed by RNA-Seq. Results showed that more differentially expressed genes involved in oxidoreductase function, hormonal signal transduction and the glycolytic pathway were enriched in ‘Red tangerine vs Canton lemon’. qRT-PCR analysis showed that expression levels of ARF1, ARF8, GH3 and IAA4 were negatively correlated with the growth vigor and IAA content. The metabolism of GA was influenced by the differential expression of KO1 and GA2OX1 in grafted trees. In addition, most of antioxidant enzyme genes were up-regulated in leaves of trees grafted onto Red tangerine, resulting in a higher peroxidase activity. We concluded that different rootstocks significantly affected the expression of genes involved in auxin signal transduction pathway and GA biosynthesis pathway in the grafted plants, and then regulated the hormone levels and their signal pathways. PMID:28081213
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Effect of thiabendazole and packing materials on kinnow mandarin during storage
International Nuclear Information System (INIS)
Farooqi, W.A.; Ahmad, Maqbool; Hussain, A.M.; Qureshi, M.J.
1975-01-01
Effects of thiabendazole and some packing materials (tissue paper, wax paper and polyethylene film) on the shelf-life of Kinnow mandarins during storage at refrigerated and non-refrigerated temperatures were studied. Physiological, and organoleptic characteristics; control of fruit-rot in treated and untreated fruits and residual effect of thiabendazole in the peel and pulp of treated fruits are reported
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Effect of thiabendazole and packing materials on kinnow mandarin during storage
Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)
Farooqi, W A; Ahmad, Maqbool; Hussain, A M; Qureshi, M J
1975-01-01
Effects of thiabendazole and some packing materials (tissue paper, wax paper and polyethylene film) on the shelf-life of Kinnow mandarins during storage at refrigerated and non-refrigerated temperatures were studied. Physiological, and organoleptic characteristics; control of fruit-rot in treated and untreated fruits and residual effect of thiabendazole in the peel and pulp of treated fruits are reported.
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Discrimination Between Native and Non-Native Speech Using Visual Features Only
Georgakis, Christos; Petridis, Stavros; Pantic, Maja
2016-01-01
Accent is a soft biometric trait that can be inferred from pronunciation and articulation patterns characterizing the speaking style of an individual. Past research has addressed the task of classifying accent, as belonging to a native language speaker or a foreign language speaker, by means of the
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Acoustic and Perceptual Correlates of Foreign Accent Syndrome with Manic Etiology: A Case Study
Lewis, Skye; Ball, Laura J.; Kitten, Suzanna
2013-01-01
In foreign accent syndrome (FAS), changes in articulation and prosody cause listeners to perceive the speaker as "foreign-sounding." Fewer than 100 cases of FAS have been described in the literature; commonly associated with brain damage, only a handful of these have been analyzed with respect to acoustic measures. Acoustic and…
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The socially-weighted encoding of spoken words: A dual-route approach to speech perception
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Meghan eSumner
2014-01-01
Full Text Available Spoken words are highly variable. A single word may never be uttered the same way twice. As listeners, we regularly encounter speakers of different ages, genders, and accents, increasing the amount of variation we face. How listeners understand spoken words as quickly and adeptly as they do despite this variation remains an issue central to linguistic theory. We propose that learned acoustic patterns are mapped simultaneously to linguistic representations and to social representations. In doing so, we illuminate a paradox that results in the literature from, we argue, the focus on representations and the peripheral treatment of word-level phonetic variation. We consider phonetic variation more fully and highlight a growing body of work that is problematic for current theory: Words with different pronunciation variants are recognized equally well in immediate processing tasks, while an atypical, infrequent, but socially-idealized form is remembered better in the long-term. We suggest that the perception of spoken words is socially-weighted, resulting in sparse, but high-resolution clusters of socially-idealized episodes that are robust in immediate processing and are more strongly encoded, predicting memory inequality. Our proposal includes a dual-route approach to speech perception in which listeners map acoustic patterns in speech to linguistic and social representations in tandem. This approach makes novel predictions about the extraction of information from the speech signal, and provides a framework with which we can ask new questions. We propose that language comprehension, broadly, results from the integration of both linguistic and social information.
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The socially weighted encoding of spoken words: a dual-route approach to speech perception.
Sumner, Meghan; Kim, Seung Kyung; King, Ed; McGowan, Kevin B
2013-01-01
Spoken words are highly variable. A single word may never be uttered the same way twice. As listeners, we regularly encounter speakers of different ages, genders, and accents, increasing the amount of variation we face. How listeners understand spoken words as quickly and adeptly as they do despite this variation remains an issue central to linguistic theory. We propose that learned acoustic patterns are mapped simultaneously to linguistic representations and to social representations. In doing so, we illuminate a paradox that results in the literature from, we argue, the focus on representations and the peripheral treatment of word-level phonetic variation. We consider phonetic variation more fully and highlight a growing body of work that is problematic for current theory: words with different pronunciation variants are recognized equally well in immediate processing tasks, while an atypical, infrequent, but socially idealized form is remembered better in the long-term. We suggest that the perception of spoken words is socially weighted, resulting in sparse, but high-resolution clusters of socially idealized episodes that are robust in immediate processing and are more strongly encoded, predicting memory inequality. Our proposal includes a dual-route approach to speech perception in which listeners map acoustic patterns in speech to linguistic and social representations in tandem. This approach makes novel predictions about the extraction of information from the speech signal, and provides a framework with which we can ask new questions. We propose that language comprehension, broadly, results from the integration of both linguistic and social information.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Anthony Pak Hin Kong
2014-03-01
Full Text Available Introduction Compared to the English literature, there is a great paucity of studies focusing on quantitative analysis of aphasic oral discourse in Chinese, especially for native speakers of Taiwanese-Mandarin residing in Taiwan. Several studies that investigated deficits of aphasic discourse have been conducted in Cantonese Chinese, including the Cantonese Linguistic Communication Measure (CLCM, Kong & Law, 2004, Main Concept Analysis (MCA; Kong, 2009, and Cantonese version of the Quantitative Production Analysis (Law, 2001; Yiu & Worrall, 1996. Clinical or research application of these systems to the Taiwanese population is limited by the differences of phonology, semantics, and grammar between Taiwanese Mandarin and Cantonese. The current study, therefore, aimed to develop a culturally appropriate Taiwan Mandarin Main Concept Analysis (TM-MCA, by translating and adapting the MCA in Cantonese (Kong, 2009, 2011, and then to validate the tool on the basis of normal speakers and people with aphasia in Taiwan. Method Picture stimuli and main concepts for the TM-MCA: Eight certified Taiwanese SLPs participated and listed all main concepts upon presentation of the sequential pictures in Kong (2009. A main concept referred to a statement consisting of only one main verb with two or more pieces of essential information accurately related to the pictures and informative about the content. All main concepts mentioned by six out of eight SLPs were included in a preliminary main concept list. Further validation of the list involved recruiting eight normal speakers to orally describe the same picture sets. Only those scored as Accurate and Complete (AC or Accurate but Incomplete (AI by at least five speakers were put in the final list. Normative and aphasic data collection and analysis: Thirty six native Taiwanese Mandarin speakers and ten individuals with aphasia orally perform the same picture description tasks. Six measures, including Number of Accurate
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Using Extra-Linguistic Material for Mandarin-French Verbal Constructions Comparison
Magistry, Pierre; Prevot, Laurent; Cheung, Hintat; Shiao, C.Y; Desalle, Yann; Gaume, Bruno
2009-01-01
International audience; Systematic cross-linguistic studies of verbs syntactic-semantic behaviors for ty-pologically distant languages such as Mandarin Chinese and French are difficult to conduct.Such studies are nevertheless necessary due to the crucial role that verbal constructions playin the mental lexicon. This paper addresses the problem by combining psycho-linguisticsand computational methods. Psycho-linguistics provides us with a bilingual corpus that fea-tures verbal construction ass...
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An analysis of machine translation and speech synthesis in speech-to-speech translation system
Hashimoto, K.; Yamagishi, J.; Byrne, W.; King, S.; Tokuda, K.
2011-01-01
This paper provides an analysis of the impacts of machine translation and speech synthesis on speech-to-speech translation systems. The speech-to-speech translation system consists of three components: speech recognition, machine translation and speech synthesis. Many techniques for integration of speech recognition and machine translation have been proposed. However, speech synthesis has not yet been considered. Therefore, in this paper, we focus on machine translation and speech synthesis, ...
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
María A. Velásquez
2014-01-01
Full Text Available The fungi Penicillium digitatum and P. italicumrepresent the main global economic loss to the citrus industry during postharvest stage. Nowadays, the use of fungicides is increasingly restricted due to their carcinogenic, teratogenic, high residuality, long degradation period, environmental contamination, increased pathogen resistance, among others. Natural antimicrobial compounds could be a safe and viable option to minimize disease losses facing the industry. In this study, we evaluated in vitro the activity of tymol, carvacrol and commercial mandarin oil (Italian Mandarin at concentrations of 40 and 50 ppm using the agar diffusion method and microbiological testing. All the essential oils evaluated for both fungi, showed an inhibition rate between 50% and 100%, and the effect was higher at doses of 50 ppm. This effect was followed by inhibition of sporulation and germination. Carvacrol showed the higher antifungal activity for both fungi studied. P. digitatum showed a greater sensitivity to the effect of the essential oils evaluated compared to P. italicum. Commercial mandarin essential oil can be an alternative to the control of postharvest diseases caused by Penicillium sp. in plant products.
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On-Line Smiles: Does Gender Make a Difference in the Use of Graphic Accents?
Witmer, Diane; Katzman, Sandra
1997-01-01
Examines whether it is possible to determine the gender of a message sender from cues in the message. Finds partial support for the hypothesis that women use more graphic accents than men do in their computer-mediated communication. Finds also that women tend to challenge and "flame" more than men. Discusses implications and poses…
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Alessandra A. de Souza
2007-01-01
Full Text Available The Citrus ESTs Sequencing Project (CitEST conducted at Centro APTA Citros Sylvio Moreira/IAC has identified and catalogued ESTs representing a set of citrus genes expressed under relevant stress responses, including diseases such as citrus variegated chlorosis (CVC, caused by Xylella fastidiosa. All sweet orange (Citrus sinensis L. Osb. varieties are susceptible to X. fastidiosa. On the other hand, mandarins (C. reticulata Blanco are considered tolerant or resistant to the disease, although the bacterium can be sporadically detected within the trees, but no disease symptoms or economic losses are observed. To study their genetic responses to the presence of X. fastidiosa, we have compared EST libraries of leaf tissue of sweet orange Pêra IAC (highly susceptible cultivar to X. fastidiosa and mandarin ‘Ponkan’ (tolerant artificially infected with the bacterium. Using an in silico differential display, 172 genes were found to be significantly differentially expressed in such conditions. Sweet orange presented an increase in expression of photosynthesis related genes that could reveal a strategy to counterbalance a possible lower photosynthetic activity resulting from early effects of the bacterial colonization in affected plants. On the other hand, mandarin showed an active multi-component defense response against the bacterium similar to the non-host resistance pattern.
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Behavioral and subcortical signatures of musical expertise in Mandarin Chinese speakers.
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Caitlin Dawson
Full Text Available Both musical training and native language have been shown to have experience-based plastic effects on auditory processing. However, the combined effects within individuals are unclear. Recent research suggests that musical training and tone language speaking are not clearly additive in their effects on processing of auditory features and that there may be a disconnect between perceptual and neural signatures of auditory feature processing. The literature has only recently begun to investigate the effects of musical expertise on basic auditory processing for different linguistic groups. This work provides a profile of primary auditory feature discrimination for Mandarin speaking musicians and nonmusicians. The musicians showed enhanced perceptual discrimination for both frequency and duration as well as enhanced duration discrimination in a multifeature discrimination task, compared to nonmusicians. However, there were no differences between the groups in duration processing of nonspeech sounds at a subcortical level or in subcortical frequency representation of a nonnative tone contour, for fo or for the first or second formant region. The results indicate that musical expertise provides a cognitive, but not subcortical, advantage in a population of Mandarin speakers.
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Morrill, Tuuli H; McAuley, J Devin; Dilley, Laura C; Hambrick, David Z
2015-08-01
Do the same mechanisms underlie processing of music and language? Recent investigations of this question have yielded inconsistent results. Likely factors contributing to discrepant findings are use of small samples and failure to control for individual differences in cognitive ability. We investigated the relationship between music and speech prosody processing, while controlling for cognitive ability. Participants (n = 179) completed a battery of cognitive ability tests, the Montreal Battery of Evaluation of Amusia (MBEA) to assess music perception, and a prosody test of pitch peak timing discrimination (early, as in insight vs. late, incite). Structural equation modeling revealed that only music perception was a significant predictor of prosody test performance. Music perception accounted for 34.5% of variance on prosody test performance; cognitive abilities and music training added only about 8%. These results indicate musical pitch and temporal processing are highly predictive of pitch discrimination in speech processing, even after controlling for other possible predictors of this aspect of language processing. (c) 2015 APA, all rights reserved).
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Foreign Accent Syndrome Secondary to Medication Withdrawal: A Case Report
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Michael J. Schuh
2017-08-01
Full Text Available Objective: The purpose of this case report is to demonstrate a possible alternative etiology related to dopamine may exist for foreign accent syndrome (FAS. Methods: A 79-year-old, 205 pound, Caucasian woman originally presented to the department of Neurology for treatment and subsequently to the pharmacist pharmacotherapy service for evaluation of bilateral upper extremity tremor of high amplitude but was found to also exhibit FAS. Discussion: This case report contributes to the limited literature regarding foreign accent syndrome and adds to the few case reports of psychogenic origin, as opposed to the majority, which are of neurogenic origin. This also represents the first case that seems related to withdrawal of medication rather than psychotic exacerbation and ranks a six on the Naranjo algorithm. Conclusion: FAS is a rare disorder and little is understood about it. This case presentation also suggests that chronic use of high-dose dopamine and/or anticholinergic agents may alter pathways in the brain, which in this case, may have potentially contributed to the development of FAS. There remain many unanswered questions regarding FAS, but hopefully more clarity may be found as more cases are discovered and published. Conflict of Interest I declare no conflicts of interest or financial interests that the authors or members of their immediate families have in any product or service discussed in the manuscript, including grants (pending or received, employment, gifts, stock holdings or options, honoraria, consultancies, expert testimony, patents and royalties. Type: Case Study
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Effects of Strength of Accent on an L2 Interactive Lecture Listening Comprehension Test
Ockey, Gary J.; Papageorgiou, Spiros; French, Robert
2016-01-01
This article reports on a study which aimed to determine the effect of strength of accent on listening comprehension of interactive lectures. Test takers (N = 21,726) listened to an interactive lecture given by one of nine speakers and responded to six comprehension items. The test taker responses were analyzed with the Rasch computer program…
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Wu, Dan; Chen, Jian-yong; Wang, Shuo; Zhang, Man-hua; Chen, Jing; Li, Yu-ling; Zhang, Hua
2013-03-01
To evaluate the relationship between the Mandarin acceptable noise level (ANL) and the personality trait for normal-hearing adults. Eighty-five Mandarin speakers, aged from 21 to 27, participated in this study. ANL materials and the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ) questionnaire were used to test the acceptable noise level and the personality trait for normal-hearing subjects. SPSS 17.0 was used to analyze the results. ANL were (7.8 ± 2.9) dB in normal hearing participants. The P and N scores in EPQ were significantly correlated with ANL (r = 0.284 and 0.318, P 0.05). Listeners with higher ANL were more likely to be eccentric, hostile, aggressive, and instabe, no ANL differences were found in listeners who were different in introvert-extravert or lying.
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Children's Use of Phonological Information in Ambiguity Resolution: A View from Mandarin Chinese
Zhou, Peng; Su, Yi; Crain, Stephen; Gao, Liqun; Zhan, Likan
2012-01-01
How do children develop the mapping between prosody and other levels of linguistic knowledge? This question has received considerable attention in child language research. In the present study two experiments were conducted to investigate four- to five-year-old Mandarin-speaking children's sensitivity to prosody in ambiguity resolution. Experiment…
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Multidimensional Approach to the Development of a Mandarin Chinese-Oriented Sound Test
Hung, Yu-Chen; Lin, Chun-Yi; Tsai, Li-Chiun; Lee, Ya-Jung
2016-01-01
Purpose: Because the Ling six-sound test is based on American English phonemes, it can yield unreliable results when administered to non-English speakers. In this study, we aimed to improve specifically the diagnostic palette for Mandarin Chinese users by developing an adapted version of the Ling six-sound test. Method: To determine the set of…
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Sequencing and expression analysis of CD3γ/δ and CD3ɛ chains in mandarin fish, Siniperca chuatsi
Guo, Zheng; Nie, Pin
2013-01-01
The genomic and cDNA sequences of the CD3γ/δ and CD3ɛ homologues in the mandarin fish, Siniperca chuats i, were determined. As in other vertebrate CD3 molecules, the deduced amino acid sequences of mandarin fish CD3γ/δ and CD3ɛ contained conserved residues and motifs, such as cysteine residues and CXXC and immunoreceptor tyrosine-based activation motifs. However, mandarin fish CD3γ/δ and CD3ɛ showed some differences to their mammalian counterparts, specifically the absence of a negatively charged residue in the transmembrane region of CD3γ/δ. Additionally, while an N -glycosylation site was present in CD3ɛ, the site was not observed in CD3γ/δ. The CD3γ/δ and CD3ɛ subunit sequences contain six and five exons, respectively, consistent with homologues from Atlantic salmon, Salmo salar. Phylogenetic analysis also revealed that CD3γ/δ and CD3ɛ in mandarin fish are closely related to their counterparts in Acanthopterygian fish. Real-time PCR showed CD3γ/δ and CD3ɛ were expressed mainly in the thymus and spleen in normal healthy fish and, to a lesser extent, in mucosal-associated lymphoid tissues, such as the intestine and gills. When lymphocytes isolated from head kidney were treated with the mitogens phytohemagglutinin, concanavalin, and polyriboinosinic polyribocytidylic acid, mRNA expression levels of CD3γ/δ and CD3ɛ were significantly elevated within 12 h of treatment. This indicated the presence of T lymphocytes in the head kidney of teleost fish, and also the recognition of mitogens by the lymphocytes. Mandarin fish infected with the bacterial pathogen Flavobacterium columnare also showed an increase in the expression of CD3γ/δ and CD3ɛ mRNA, indicating that CD3γ/δ and CD3ɛ lymphocytes are involved in the immune response of this species.
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Response of 'Nagpur' mandarin, 'Mosambi' sweet orange and 'Kagzi' acid lime to gamma radiation
International Nuclear Information System (INIS)
Ladaniya, M.S.; Singh, Shyam; Wadhawan, A.K.
2003-01-01
The effects of irradiation dose and refrigerated storage conditions on 'Nagpur' mandarin (Citrus reticulata Blanco), 'Mosambi' sweet orange (Citrus sinensis Osbeck) and 'Kagzi' acid lime (Citrus aurantifolia Swingle) were investigated. Mature fruits of these three species were treated with 0, 0.25, 0.5, 1 and 1.5 kGy radiation. 'Nagpur' mandarin and 'Mosambi' sweet oranges were stored at 6-7 deg. C and 90-95% r.h. for 75 and 90 days, respectively, while 'Kagzi' acid limes were stored at 8±1 deg. C and 90-95% r.h. for 90 days. Physico-chemical parameters, sensory attributes and respiration rate were measured besides losses and disorders. In 'Nagpur' mandarin, radiation dose upto 1.5 kGy did not cause any rind disorder. Radiation treatments did not reduce the extent of decay. Penicillium rot was delayed in fruit treated with 1.5 kGy, while it appeared early in 0 kGy. Irradiation doses were ineffective to control rots due to Botryodiplodia theobromae and Alternaria citri. Doses upto 1.5 kGy did not cause any significant effect on fruit firmness and juice content; however, total soluble solids increased, while titratable acidity and vitamin 'C' content decreased. Texture and flavour scores as recorded after a week, were not affected by irradiation except in 1.5 kGy. In 'Mosambi' sweet orange, radiation treatments caused peel disorder in the form of brown sunken areas after 90 days and reduced fruit firmness, acidity and vitamin C content. The TSS content was higher in treated fruit. Flavour and texture were not affected by the doses of irradiation used. In treated acid limes (mature yellow), weight loss and decay were higher than untreated fruit (0 kGy) although difference was non-significant. Juice, TSS, titratable acidity and vitamin C contents were significantly less in treated fruit than in 0 kGy. Texture and flavour scores were also less in treated fruit than in 0 kGy. The stem-end rind breakdown was higher in untreated fruit than treated ones although difference
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Putri Hijir
2016-08-01
Full Text Available The background of this research was the effect of Customer to Customer Interaction affect satisfaction, word of mouth, in mandarin oriental hotel. The objective of this research is to examine the impact of Customer satisfaction, Service Atmosphere, Personal Interaction, Customer Customer Interaction, Word of Mouth. The design of this research applies primary data obtained by distributing questionnaires to 200 customer who are using Mandarin Oriental Hotel. Data analysis method used in this research is Structural Equation Model (SEM. The result of this research there is positive impact Personal Interaction Quality toward customer Satisfaction, there is positive impact Service Atmosphere toward Customer Satisfaction, there is positive impact Service atmosphere toward Customer Customer Interaction, there is positive impact Customer Customer Interaction toward Customer Satisfaction, there is positive impact Customer Customer Interaction toward Word of Mouth, there is positive impact Customer Satisfaction toward Word of Mouth.
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Neural Entrainment to Speech Modulates Speech Intelligibility
Riecke, Lars; Formisano, Elia; Sorger, Bettina; Baskent, Deniz; Gaudrain, Etienne
2018-01-01
Speech is crucial for communication in everyday life. Speech-brain entrainment, the alignment of neural activity to the slow temporal fluctuations (envelope) of acoustic speech input, is a ubiquitous element of current theories of speech processing. Associations between speech-brain entrainment and
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Liu, Fang; Jiang, Cunmei; Pfordresher, Peter Q; Mantell, James T; Xu, Yi; Yang, Yufang; Stewart, Lauren
2013-11-01
In this study, we investigated the impact of congenital amusia, a disorder of musical processing, on speech and song imitation in speakers of a tone language, Mandarin. A group of 13 Mandarin-speaking individuals with congenital amusia and 13 matched controls were recorded while imitating a set of speech and two sets of song stimuli with varying pitch and rhythm patterns. The results indicated that individuals with congenital amusia were worse than controls in both speech and song imitation, in terms of both pitch matching (absolute and relative) and rhythm matching (relative time and number of time errors). Like the controls, individuals with congenital amusia achieved better absolute and relative pitch matching and made fewer pitch interval and contour errors in song than in speech imitation. These findings point toward domain-general pitch (and time) production deficits in congenital amusia, suggesting the presence of shared pitch production mechanisms but distinct requirements for pitch-matching accuracy in language and music processing.
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The Use of Grammatical Morphemes by Mandarin-Speaking Children with High Functioning Autism
Zhou, Peng; Crain, Stephen; Gao, Liqun; Tang, Ye; Jia, Meixiang
2015-01-01
The present study investigated the production of grammatical morphemes by Mandarin-speaking children with high functioning autism. Previous research found that a subgroup of English-speaking children with autism exhibit deficits in the use of grammatical morphemes that mark tense. In order to see whether this impairment in grammatical morphology…
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Development of TTS Engine for Indian Accent using Modified HMM Algorithm
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Sasanko Sekhar Gantayat
2018-03-01
Full Text Available A text-to-speech (TTS system converts normal language text into speech. An intelligent text-to-speech program allows people with visual impairments or reading disabilities, to listen to written works on a home computer. Many computer operating systems and day to day software applications like Adobe Reader have included text-to-speech systems. This paper is presented to show that how HMM can be used as a tool to convert text to speech.
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Sadhana | Indian Academy of Sciences
Indian Academy of Sciences (India)
Home; Journals; Sadhana. K Samudravijaya. Articles written in Sadhana. Volume 27 Issue 1 February 2002 pp 113-126. Indian accent text-to-speech system for web browsing · Aniruddha Sen K Samudravijaya · More Details Abstract Fulltext PDF. Incorporation of speech and Indian scripts can greatly enhance the ...
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Paragraph-reading comprehension ability in Mandarin-speaking children with cochlear implants.
Wu, Che-Ming; Lee, Li-Ang; Chao, Wei-Chieh; Tsou, Yung-Ting; Chen, Yen-An
2015-06-01
1) To investigate different aspects of paragraph reading in Mandarin-speaking students with cochlear implants (CIs) and the factors associated with unfavorable outcomes, and 2) to understand the replaceability of a paragraph-reading test with a sentence-reading test. Cross-sectional, case-controlled study. Fifty-three students with CIs (aged 11.0 ± 1.4 years) and 53 grade- and gender-matched children with normal hearing (NH) participated in the study. A paragraph-reading comprehension test was conducted. Sentence and word reading, speech perception, language skills, and child/family characteristics were examined. An unfavorable paragraph-reading outcome was defined as a score lower than one standard deviation below the NH mean. The CI subjects had significantly worse paragraph-reading comprehension than did the NH controls (P = 0.017, d = 0.54). Their performance in grades 5 to 6 was not significantly higher than of those with NH in grades 2 to 4. The CI children's abilities to understand semantics (P = 0.012) and syntax (P = 0.020) significantly fell behind the NH controls in grades 2 to 4, and the lag continued in grades 5 to 6 (P = 0.039, P = 0.002, respectively). Grade and sentence reading were independently associated with unfavorable paragraph-reading outcomes (R(2) = 0.453). The optimal sensitivity and specificity of the sentence-reading test in identifying unfavorable paragraph-reading outcomes were 90.9% and 90.0%, respectively (area under the curve = 0.923). Specialists should pay attention to CI students' development of different reading skills. Paragraph-reading tests enable a multidimensional evaluation of reading competence. Use of sentence-reading tests is suggested only as a tool for preliminary screening for basic reading capacities. 3b. © 2014 The American Laryngological, Rhinological and Otological Society, Inc.
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Jin, Tinghe
2017-01-01
This paper reports on a study of the identity perceptions of undergraduate and postgraduate students of Mandarin at UK universities. Interviews with 26 students were conducted over a three-year period, most of whom were multilingual. Approximately half spoke English as an additional language. The remainder were native speakers of English. The…
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Russo, Frank A.
2018-01-01
The RAVDESS is a validated multimodal database of emotional speech and song. The database is gender balanced consisting of 24 professional actors, vocalizing lexically-matched statements in a neutral North American accent. Speech includes calm, happy, sad, angry, fearful, surprise, and disgust expressions, and song contains calm, happy, sad, angry, and fearful emotions. Each expression is produced at two levels of emotional intensity, with an additional neutral expression. All conditions are available in face-and-voice, face-only, and voice-only formats. The set of 7356 recordings were each rated 10 times on emotional validity, intensity, and genuineness. Ratings were provided by 247 individuals who were characteristic of untrained research participants from North America. A further set of 72 participants provided test-retest data. High levels of emotional validity and test-retest intrarater reliability were reported. Corrected accuracy and composite "goodness" measures are presented to assist researchers in the selection of stimuli. All recordings are made freely available under a Creative Commons license and can be downloaded at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1188976. PMID:29768426
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Leung, Lanna Oi-Ling; Lewis, George F.
1999-01-01
Examined effects of ethnolinguistic differences on social proximity between Cantonese- and Mandarin-speaking Chinese children in a day care center. Found that each group of children was more likely to be in closer proximity to children speaking their own language than to children speaking the other language during free choice floor- and group-time…
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Economic Returns to Speaking "Standard Mandarin" among Migrants in China's Urban Labour Market
Gao, Wenshu; Smyth, Russell
2011-01-01
This article uses data from the China Urban Labour Survey administered across 12 cities in 2005 to estimate the economic returns to speaking standard Mandarin among internal migrants in China's urban labour market. The article builds on studies that estimate the economic returns to international immigrants of being fluent in the major language of…
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Vowels in infant-directed speech: More breathy and more variable, but not clearer.
Miyazawa, Kouki; Shinya, Takahito; Martin, Andrew; Kikuchi, Hideaki; Mazuka, Reiko
2017-09-01
Infant-directed speech (IDS) is known to differ from adult-directed speech (ADS) in a number of ways, and it has often been argued that some of these IDS properties facilitate infants' acquisition of language. An influential study in support of this view is Kuhl et al. (1997), which found that vowels in IDS are produced with expanded first and second formants (F1/F2) on average, indicating that the vowels are acoustically further apart in IDS than in ADS. These results have been interpreted to mean that the way vowels are produced in IDS makes infants' task of learning vowel categories easier. The present paper revisits this interpretation by means of a thorough analysis of IDS vowels using a large-scale corpus of Japanese natural utterances. We will show that the expansion of F1/F2 values does occur in spontaneous IDS even when the vowels' prosodic position, lexical pitch accent, and lexical bias are accounted for. When IDS vowels are compared to carefully read speech (CS) by the same mothers, however, larger variability among IDS vowel tokens means that the acoustic distances among vowels are farther apart only in CS, but not in IDS when compared to ADS. Finally, we will show that IDS vowels are significantly more breathy than ADS or CS vowels. Taken together, our results demonstrate that even though expansion of formant values occurs in spontaneous IDS, this expansion cannot be interpreted as an indication that the acoustic distances among vowels are farther apart, as is the case in CS. Instead, we found that IDS vowels are characterized by breathy voice, which has been associated with the communication of emotional affect. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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Inner Speech's Relationship With Overt Speech in Poststroke Aphasia.
Stark, Brielle C; Geva, Sharon; Warburton, Elizabeth A
2017-09-18
Relatively preserved inner speech alongside poor overt speech has been documented in some persons with aphasia (PWA), but the relationship of overt speech with inner speech is still largely unclear, as few studies have directly investigated these factors. The present study investigates the relationship of relatively preserved inner speech in aphasia with selected measures of language and cognition. Thirty-eight persons with chronic aphasia (27 men, 11 women; average age 64.53 ± 13.29 years, time since stroke 8-111 months) were classified as having relatively preserved inner and overt speech (n = 21), relatively preserved inner speech with poor overt speech (n = 8), or not classified due to insufficient measurements of inner and/or overt speech (n = 9). Inner speech scores (by group) were correlated with selected measures of language and cognition from the Comprehensive Aphasia Test (Swinburn, Porter, & Al, 2004). The group with poor overt speech showed a significant relationship of inner speech with overt naming (r = .95, p speech and language and cognition factors were not significant for the group with relatively good overt speech. As in previous research, we show that relatively preserved inner speech is found alongside otherwise severe production deficits in PWA. PWA with poor overt speech may rely more on preserved inner speech for overt picture naming (perhaps due to shared resources with verbal working memory) and for written picture description (perhaps due to reliance on inner speech due to perceived task difficulty). Assessments of inner speech may be useful as a standard component of aphasia screening, and therapy focused on improving and using inner speech may prove clinically worthwhile. https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.5303542.
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Diab, Kawthar Ae
2016-01-01
In recent years, there has been considerable research on recycling of agroindustrial waste for production of bioactive compounds. The food processing industry produces large amounts of citrus peels that may be an inexpensive source of useful agents. The present work aimed to explore the phytochemical content, antioxidant, anticancer, antiproliferation, and antigenotxic activities of lemon, grapefruit, and mandarin peels. Peels were extracted using 98% ethanol and the three crude extracts were assessed for their total polyphenol content (TPC), total flavonoid content (TFC), and antioxidant activity using DPPH (1, 1diphenyl2picrylhydrazyl). Their cytotoxic and mitogenic proliferation activities were also studied in human leukemia HL60 cells and mouse splenocytes by CCK8 assay. In addition, genotoxic/ antigenotoxic activity was explored in mouse splenocytes using chromosomal aberrations (CAs) assay. Lemon peels had the highest of TPC followed by grapefruit and mandarin. In contrast, mandarin peels contained the highest of TFC followed by lemon and grapefruit peels. Among the extracts, lemon peel possessed the strongest antioxidant activity as indicated by the highest DPPH radical scavenging, the lowest effective concentration 50% (EC50= 42.97 ?g extract/ mL), and the highest Trolox equivalent antioxidant capacity (TEAC=0.157). Mandarin peel exhibited moderate cytotoxic activity (IC50 = 77.8 ?g/mL) against HL60 cells, whereas grapefruit and lemon peels were ineffective antileukemia. Further, citrus peels possessed immunostimulation activity via augmentation of proliferation of mouse splenocytes (Tlymphocytes). Citrus extracts exerted noncytotoxic, and antigenotoxic activities through remarkable reduction of CAs induced by cisplatin in mouse splenocytes for 24 h. The phytochemical constituents of the citrus peels may exert biological activities including anticancer, immunostimulation and antigenotoxic potential.
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Musician advantage for speech-on-speech perception
Başkent, Deniz; Gaudrain, Etienne
Evidence for transfer of musical training to better perception of speech in noise has been mixed. Unlike speech-in-noise, speech-on-speech perception utilizes many of the skills that musical training improves, such as better pitch perception and stream segregation, as well as use of higher-level
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[The role of temporal fine structure in tone recognition and music perception].
Zhou, Q; Gu, X; Liu, B
2017-11-07
The sound signal can be decomposed into temporal envelope and temporal fine structure information. The temporal envelope information is crucial for speech perception in quiet environment, and the temporal fine structure information plays an important role in speech perception in noise, Mandarin tone recognition and music perception, especially the pitch and melody perception.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
J. SANGEETHA
2015-02-01
Full Text Available This paper provides an interface between the machine translation and speech synthesis system for converting English speech to Tamil text in English to Tamil speech to speech translation system. The speech translation system consists of three modules: automatic speech recognition, machine translation and text to speech synthesis. Many procedures for incorporation of speech recognition and machine translation have been projected. Still speech synthesis system has not yet been measured. In this paper, we focus on integration of machine translation and speech synthesis, and report a subjective evaluation to investigate the impact of speech synthesis, machine translation and the integration of machine translation and speech synthesis components. Here we implement a hybrid machine translation (combination of rule based and statistical machine translation and concatenative syllable based speech synthesis technique. In order to retain the naturalness and intelligibility of synthesized speech Auto Associative Neural Network (AANN prosody prediction is used in this work. The results of this system investigation demonstrate that the naturalness and intelligibility of the synthesized speech are strongly influenced by the fluency and correctness of the translated text.
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Kurz, A Solomon; Drescher, Christopher F; Chin, Eu Gene; Johnson, Laura R
2016-06-01
Malaysia is a Southeast Asian country in which multiple languages are prominently spoken, including English and Mandarin Chinese. As psychological science continues to develop within Malaysia, there is a need for psychometrically sound instruments that measure psychological phenomena in multiple languages. For example, assessment tools for measuring social desirability could be a useful addition in psychological assessments and research studies in a Malaysian context. This study examined the psychometric performance of the English and Mandarin Chinese versions of the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale when used in Malaysia. Two hundred and eighty-three students (64% female; 83% Chinese, 9% Indian) from two college campuses completed the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale in their language of choice (i.e., English or Mandarin Chinese). Proposed factor structures were compared with confirmatory factor analysis, and multiple indicators-multiple causes models were used to examine measurement invariance across language and sex. Factor analyses supported a two-factor structure (i.e., Attribution and Denial) for the measure. Invariance tests revealed the scale was invariant by sex, indicating that social desirability can be interpreted similarly across sex. The scale was partially invariant by language version, with some non-invariance observed within the Denial factor. Non-invariance may be related to differences in the English and Mandarin Chinese languages, as well as cultural differences. Directions for further research include examining the measurement of social desirability in other contexts where both English and Mandarin Chinese are spoken (i.e., China) and further examining the causes of non-invariance on specific items. © 2016 The Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences and John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Paola eEscudero
2014-09-01
Full Text Available Although infants perceptually attune to native vowels and consonants well before 12 months, at 13–15 months, they have difficulty learning to associate novel words that differ by their initial consonant (e.g., BIN and DIN to their visual referents. However, this difficulty may not apply to all minimal-pair novel words. While Canadian English (CE 15-month-olds failed to respond to a switch from the newly learned word DEET to the novel nonword DOOT, they did notice a switch from DEET to DIT (Curtin, Fennell, & Escudero, 2009. Those authors argued that early word learners capitalize on large phonetic differences, seen in CE DEET–DIT, but not on smaller phonetic differences, as in CE DEET–DOOT. To assess this hypothesis, we tested Australian English (AusE 15-month-olds, as AusE has a smaller magnitude of phonetic difference in both novel word pairs. Two groups of infants were trained on the novel word DEET and tested on the vowel switches in DIT and DOOT, produced by an AusE female speaker or the same CE female speaker as in Curtin et al. (2009. If the size of the phonetic distinction plays a more central role than native accent experience in early word learning, AusE children should more easily recognize both of the unfamiliar but larger CE vowel switches than the more familiar but smaller AusE ones. The results support our phonetic-magnitude hypothesis: AusE children taught and tested with the CE-accented novel words looked longer to both of the switch test trials (DIT, DOOT than same test trials (DEET, while those who heard the AusE-accented tokens did not notice either switch. Implications of our findings for models of early word learning are discussed.
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Beat processing is pre-attentive for metrically simple rhythms with clear accents: an ERP study.
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Fleur L Bouwer
Full Text Available The perception of a regular beat is fundamental to music processing. Here we examine whether the detection of a regular beat is pre-attentive for metrically simple, acoustically varying stimuli using the mismatch negativity (MMN, an ERP response elicited by violations of acoustic regularity irrespective of whether subjects are attending to the stimuli. Both musicians and non-musicians were presented with a varying rhythm with a clear accent structure in which occasionally a sound was omitted. We compared the MMN response to the omission of identical sounds in different metrical positions. Most importantly, we found that omissions in strong metrical positions, on the beat, elicited higher amplitude MMN responses than omissions in weak metrical positions, not on the beat. This suggests that the detection of a beat is pre-attentive when highly beat inducing stimuli are used. No effects of musical expertise were found. Our results suggest that for metrically simple rhythms with clear accents beat processing does not require attention or musical expertise. In addition, we discuss how the use of acoustically varying stimuli may influence ERP results when studying beat processing.
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Speech endpoint detection with non-language speech sounds for generic speech processing applications
McClain, Matthew; Romanowski, Brian
2009-05-01
Non-language speech sounds (NLSS) are sounds produced by humans that do not carry linguistic information. Examples of these sounds are coughs, clicks, breaths, and filled pauses such as "uh" and "um" in English. NLSS are prominent in conversational speech, but can be a significant source of errors in speech processing applications. Traditionally, these sounds are ignored by speech endpoint detection algorithms, where speech regions are identified in the audio signal prior to processing. The ability to filter NLSS as a pre-processing step can significantly enhance the performance of many speech processing applications, such as speaker identification, language identification, and automatic speech recognition. In order to be used in all such applications, NLSS detection must be performed without the use of language models that provide knowledge of the phonology and lexical structure of speech. This is especially relevant to situations where the languages used in the audio are not known apriori. We present the results of preliminary experiments using data from American and British English speakers, in which segments of audio are classified as language speech sounds (LSS) or NLSS using a set of acoustic features designed for language-agnostic NLSS detection and a hidden-Markov model (HMM) to model speech generation. The results of these experiments indicate that the features and model used are capable of detection certain types of NLSS, such as breaths and clicks, while detection of other types of NLSS such as filled pauses will require future research.
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Het poëtisch accent. Drie literaire genres in zeventiende-eeuwse Nederlandse pamfletten
Vrieler, J.A.
2007-01-01
'The poetic accent. Three literary genres in seventeenth-century Dutch pamphlets' focuses on the way the conviction works, by studying pamphlets containing sonnets, songs and echo-poetry. I distinguish between structural and affective functions of poetry. Within the composition of a pamphlet, poetry was often given an exordial or perorational function. Poetry before the main text was well suited to portray the author in a good way, to deliver the message of the pamphlet as a kind of device an...
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The time course of spoken word recognition in Mandarin Chinese: a unimodal ERP study.
Huang, Xianjun; Yang, Jin-Chen; Zhang, Qin; Guo, Chunyan
2014-10-01
In the present study, two experiments were carried out to investigate the time course of spoken word recognition in Mandarin Chinese using both event-related potentials (ERPs) and behavioral measures. To address the hypothesis that there is an early phonological processing stage independent of semantics during spoken word recognition, a unimodal word-matching paradigm was employed, in which both prime and target words were presented auditorily. Experiment 1 manipulated the phonological relations between disyllabic primes and targets, and found an enhanced P2 (200-270 ms post-target onset) as well as a smaller early N400 to word-initial phonological mismatches over fronto-central scalp sites. Experiment 2 manipulated both phonological and semantic relations between monosyllabic primes and targets, and replicated the phonological mismatch-associated P2, which was not modulated by semantic relations. Overall, these results suggest that P2 is a sensitive electrophysiological index of early phonological processing independent of semantics in Mandarin Chinese spoken word recognition. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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Word Durations in Non-Native English
Baker, Rachel E.; Baese-Berk, Melissa; Bonnasse-Gahot, Laurent; Kim, Midam; Van Engen, Kristin J.; Bradlow, Ann R.
2010-01-01
In this study, we compare the effects of English lexical features on word duration for native and non-native English speakers and for non-native speakers with different L1s and a range of L2 experience. We also examine whether non-native word durations lead to judgments of a stronger foreign accent. We measured word durations in English paragraphs read by 12 American English (AE), 20 Korean, and 20 Chinese speakers. We also had AE listeners rate the `accentedness' of these non-native speakers. AE speech had shorter durations, greater within-speaker word duration variance, greater reduction of function words, and less between-speaker variance than non-native speech. However, both AE and non-native speakers showed sensitivity to lexical predictability by reducing second mentions and high frequency words. Non-native speakers with more native-like word durations, greater within-speaker word duration variance, and greater function word reduction were perceived as less accented. Overall, these findings identify word duration as an important and complex feature of foreign-accented English. PMID:21516172
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Hrvoje Lepeduš
2005-01-01
Full Text Available The Unshiu mandarin (Citrus unshiu Marc. is the major Citrus crop in Croatia. Limiting factors for longer consumption of Unshiu mandarin are low storage performance and the appearance of chilling injuries during storage. Previous studies indicated that oxidative stress might be involved in cold-induced peel damage of harvested Citrus fruit. The aim of the present study was to investigate peroxidase distribution, isoenzyme pattern and activity in the peel of Unshiu mandarin fruit. Special goal of our study was to investigate the changes of peroxidase activity in respect to two different hot water dipping (HWD treatments (3 min at 48 and 52 °C and two different storage temperatures (1 and 3 °C combined. Peroxidase activity was detected at the border of oil glands, in the peel surface and in the conducting elements positioned in the inner part of the peel. Electrophoretic analysis revealed the presence of two peroxidase isoenzymes. There were no differences in the electrophoretic pattern after the HWD treatments and cold storage. Lowering of both total and specific peroxidase activity was measured in HWD-treated samples in comparison with the control ones. However, it appeared that significant decrease in total peroxidase activity was influenced by the storage temperatures, while the increase in total soluble protein content was influenced by the HWD pretreatment.
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Music and Speech Perception in Children Using Sung Speech.
Nie, Yingjiu; Galvin, John J; Morikawa, Michael; André, Victoria; Wheeler, Harley; Fu, Qian-Jie
2018-01-01
This study examined music and speech perception in normal-hearing children with some or no musical training. Thirty children (mean age = 11.3 years), 15 with and 15 without formal music training participated in the study. Music perception was measured using a melodic contour identification (MCI) task; stimuli were a piano sample or sung speech with a fixed timbre (same word for each note) or a mixed timbre (different words for each note). Speech perception was measured in quiet and in steady noise using a matrix-styled sentence recognition task; stimuli were naturally intonated speech or sung speech with a fixed pitch (same note for each word) or a mixed pitch (different notes for each word). Significant musician advantages were observed for MCI and speech in noise but not for speech in quiet. MCI performance was significantly poorer with the mixed timbre stimuli. Speech performance in noise was significantly poorer with the fixed or mixed pitch stimuli than with spoken speech. Across all subjects, age at testing and MCI performance were significantly correlated with speech performance in noise. MCI and speech performance in quiet was significantly poorer for children than for adults from a related study using the same stimuli and tasks; speech performance in noise was significantly poorer for young than for older children. Long-term music training appeared to benefit melodic pitch perception and speech understanding in noise in these pediatric listeners.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Hidemi Izumi
2008-01-01
Full Text Available The effects of sanitation treatments including chlorination (ca 10 ppm available chlorine of agricultural water and ethyl alcohol (70% spraying on packing shed equipment on microbial contamination on fruits and the environment were determined and compared with those in conventionally managed field and packing shed in persimmon and satsuma mandarin orchards. Chlorinated water reduced the microbial counts to levels below the lower limit of detection (1.4 log CFU/ml for bacteria and 2.0 log CFU/ml for fungi in most agricultural water samples. Microbial counts of pesticide solution, which contained the agricultural water or chlorinated water for the mixture, were lower in sanitary field than in control field in both fruit orchards. The number of bacterial and mold species detected in agricultural water, chlorinated water, and pesticide solution were almost proportional to microbial counts in each sample throughout the year. The chlorination treatment of agricultural water tended to reduce the counts of mesophiles and fungi on the peel of persimmon fruit during production season. The ethyl alcohol spray treatment on packing shed equipment resulted in a substantial microbial reduction on plastic harvest basket and container in persimmon orchard and plastic harvest basket and container, gloves, scissors, and size sorter in satsuma mandarin orchard. The spray application on packing shed equipment reduced the counts of mesophiles and fungi on the peel of persimmon fruit by >1 log CFU/g. The number of satsuma mandarin packing shed equipment containing the species found on fruit peel was higher in control than in sanitary packing shed. No human pathogens such as verotoxin-producing Escherichia coli and Salmonella were detected in any of the fruit and environmental samples. These results indicate that uses of sanitizers such as chlorine for agricultural water and ethyl alcohol for packing shed equipment would be useful in a good agricultural practices
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Hidemi Izumi
2008-01-01
Full Text Available The effects of sanitation treatments including chlorination (ca 10 ppm available chlorine of agricultural water and ethyl alcohol (70% spraying on packing shed equipment on microbial contamination on fruits and the environment were determined and compared with those in conventionally managed field and packing shed in persimmon and satsuma mandarin orchards. Chlorinated water reduced the microbial counts to levels below the lower limit of detection (1.4 log CFU/ml for bacteria and 2.0 log CFU/ml for fungi in most agricultural water samples. Microbial counts of pesticide solution, which contained the agricultural water or chlorinated water for the mixture, were lower in sanitary field than in control field in both fruit orchards. The number of bacterial and mold species detected in agricultural water, chlorinated water, and pesticide solution were almost proportional to microbial counts in each sample throughout the year. The chlorination treatment of agricultural water tended to reduce the counts of mesophiles and fungi on the peel of persimmon fruit during production season. The ethyl alcohol spray treatment on packing shed equipment resulted in a substantial microbial reduction on plastic harvest basket and container in persimmon orchard and plastic harvest basket and container, gloves, scissors, and size sorter in satsuma mandarin orchard. The spray application on packing shed equipment reduced the counts of mesophiles and fungi on the peel of persimmon fruit by 1 log CFU/g. The number of satsuma mandarin packing shed equipment containing the species found on fruit peel was higher in control than in sanitary packing shed. No human pathogens such as verotoxin-producing Escherichia coli and Salmonella were detected in any of the fruit and environmental samples. These results indicate that uses of sanitizers such as chlorine for agricultural water and ethyl alcohol for packing shed equipment would be useful in a good agricultural practices
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Kwon, Jung-Hoon; Noh, Yun Kyung; Lee, Dong-Hun; Yuk, Seong-Su; Erdene-Ochir, Tseren-Ochir; Noh, Jin-Yong; Hong, Woo-Tack; Jeong, Jei-Hyun; Jeong, Sol; Gwon, Gyeong-Bin; Song, Chang-Seon; Nahm, Sang-Soep
2017-05-01
Wild birds play a major role in the evolution, maintenance, and dissemination of highly pathogenic avian influenza viruses (HPAIV). Sub-clinical infection with HPAI in resident wild birds could be a source of dissemination of HPAIV and continuous outbreaks. In this study, the pathogenicity and infectivity of two strains of H5N8 clade 2.3.4.4 virus were evaluated in the Mandarin duck (Aix galericulata) and domestic pigeon (Columba livia domestica). None of the birds experimentally infected with H5N8 viruses showed clinical signs or mortality. The H5N8 viruses efficiently replicated in the virus-inoculated Mandarin ducks and transmitted to co-housed Mandarin ducks. Although relatively high levels of viral shedding were noted in pigeons, viral shedding was not detected in some of the pigeons and the shedding period was relatively short. Furthermore, the infection was not transmitted to co-housed pigeons. Immunohistochemical examination revealed the presence of HPAIV in multiple organs of the infected birds. Histopathological evaluation showed the presence of inflammatory responses primarily in HPAIV-positive organs. Our results indicate that Mandarin ducks and pigeons can be infected with H5N8 HPAIV without exhibiting clinical signs; thus, they may be potential healthy reservoirs of the H5N8 HPAIV. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Sarah Yong Enxhi
2012-11-01
Full Text Available The common perception of Malaysians is that they are unable to speak fluently and communicate effectively in the English language as most Malaysians do not speak English as their first language. In a country that is full of diversity in terms of race and culture, it is only natural for Malaysians to be influenced by their first language when using English as their second language. This, however, creates a problem for undergraduates who are looking for job opportunities in both local and international companies because a potential employee’s ability to communicate smoothly in English is an important criteria used by employers. This study intends to shed light on the occurrence of speech disfluencies and mispronunciations among undergraduates of a Malaysian university as well as to provide an explanation for those mispronunciations by comparing the phonetic system of the English language with the Malay and Mandarin language. With the results of this study, it is hoped that actions and measures can be taken by the academic authorities and other relevant parties to gradually improve the oral proficiency skills of undergraduates and help them to be more marketable in the future.
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... Health Info » Voice, Speech, and Language Apraxia of Speech On this page: What is apraxia of speech? ... about apraxia of speech? What is apraxia of speech? Apraxia of speech (AOS)—also known as acquired ...
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Cai, Ting; McPherson, Bradley; Li, Caiwei; Yang, Feng
2017-11-14
Conductive hearing loss simulations have attempted to estimate the speech-understanding difficulties of children with otitis media with effusion (OME). However, the validity of this approach has not been evaluated. The research aim of the present study was to investigate whether a simple, frequency-specific, attenuation-based simulation of OME-related hearing loss was able to reflect the actual effects of conductive hearing loss on speech perception. Forty-one school-age children with OME-related hearing loss were recruited. Each child with OME was matched with a same sex and age counterpart with normal hearing to make a participant pair. Pure-tone threshold differences at octave frequencies from 125 to 8000 Hz for every participant pair were used as the simulation attenuation levels for the normal-hearing children. Another group of 41 school-age otologically normal children were recruited as a control group without actual or simulated hearing loss. The Mandarin Hearing in Noise Test was utilized, and sentence recall accuracy at four signal to noise ratios (SNR) considered representative of classroom-listening conditions were derived, as well as reception thresholds for sentences (RTS) in quiet and in noise using adaptive protocols. The speech perception in quiet and in noise of children with simulated OME-related hearing loss was significantly poorer than that of otologically normal children. Analysis showed that RTS in quiet of children with OME-related hearing loss and of children with simulated OME-related hearing loss was significantly correlated and comparable. A repeated-measures analysis suggested that sentence recall accuracy obtained at 5-dB SNR, 0-dB SNR, and -5-dB SNR was similar between children with actual and simulated OME-related hearing loss. However, RTS in noise in children with OME was significantly better than that for children with simulated OME-related hearing loss. The present frequency-specific, attenuation-based simulation method reflected
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Shouse, Roger C.; Sun, Jinai
2013-01-01
This article presents a case study examining the demise of a high school Mandarin language program in a school district that appeared to offer an exceptionally friendly habitat for its survival. Though members of the school board majority who voted against funding the program offered rational explanations for their decision (e.g., insufficient…
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Falkert, Anika
2016-01-01
The aim of this paper is to offer a critical discussion of the role of native and foreign accents in L2 pronunciation teaching. Several studies concluded that classroom practices of grammar instruction are strongly influenced by teaching cultures. We will examine whether this is also the case for pronunciation teaching. While the CEFR…
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Biodiesel from Mandarin Seed Oil: A Surprising Source of Alternative Fuel
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
A. K. Azad
2017-10-01
Full Text Available Mandarin (Citrus reticulata is one of the most popular fruits in tropical and sub-tropical countries around the world. It contains about 22–34 seeds per fruit. This study investigated the potential of non-edible mandarin seed oil as an alternative fuel in Australia. The seeds were prepared after drying in the oven for 20 h to attain an optimum moisture content of around 13.22%. The crude oil was extracted from the crushed seed using 98% n-hexane solution. The biodiesel conversion reaction (transesterification was designed according to the acid value (mg KOH/g of the crude oil. The study also critically examined the effect of various reaction parameters (such as effect of methanol: oil molar ratio, % of catalyst concentration, etc. on the biodiesel conversion yield. After successful conversion of the bio-oil into biodiesel, the physio-chemical fuel properties of the virgin biodiesel were measured according to relevant ASTM standards and compared with ultra-low sulphur diesel (ULSD and standard biodiesel ASTM D6751. The fatty acid methyl esters (FAMEs were analysed by gas chromatography (GC using the EN 14103 standard. The behaviour of the biodiesel (variation of density and kinematic viscosity at various temperatures (10–40 °C was obtained and compared with that of diesel fuel. Finally, mass and energy balances were conducted for both the oil extraction and biodiesel conversion processes to analyse the total process losses of the system. The study found 49.23 wt % oil yield from mandarin seed and 96.82% conversion efficiency for converting oil to biodiesel using the designated transesterification reaction. The GC test identified eleven FAMEs. The biodiesel mainly contains palmitic acid (C16:0 26.80 vol %, stearic acid (C18:0 4.93 vol %, oleic acid (C18:1 21.43 vol % (including cis. and trans., linoleic acid (C18:2 4.07 vol %, and less than one percent each of other fatty acids. It is an important source of energy because it has a higher
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Yasukatsu Maeda
2009-08-01
Full Text Available We have developed a mulch sheet made by inflation molding of PLA, Ecoflex® and modified starch, which all have different biodegradabilities. A field test of use as an agricultural mulch sheet for mandarin oranges was carried out over two years. The mechanical properties of the mulch sheet were weakened with time during the field test, but the quality of the mandarin oranges increased, a result of the controlled degradation of the sheet. The most degradable modified starch degraded first, allowing control of the moisture on the soil. Accelerator mass spectroscopy was used for evaluation of the biomass carbon ratio. The biomass carbon ratio decreased by degradation of the biobased materials, PLA and modified starch in the mulch sheet.
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Common neural substrates support speech and non-speech vocal tract gestures.
Chang, Soo-Eun; Kenney, Mary Kay; Loucks, Torrey M J; Poletto, Christopher J; Ludlow, Christy L
2009-08-01
The issue of whether speech is supported by the same neural substrates as non-speech vocal tract gestures has been contentious. In this fMRI study we tested whether producing non-speech vocal tract gestures in humans shares the same functional neuroanatomy as non-sense speech syllables. Production of non-speech vocal tract gestures, devoid of phonological content but similar to speech in that they had familiar acoustic and somatosensory targets, was compared to the production of speech syllables without meaning. Brain activation related to overt production was captured with BOLD fMRI using a sparse sampling design for both conditions. Speech and non-speech were compared using voxel-wise whole brain analyses, and ROI analyses focused on frontal and temporoparietal structures previously reported to support speech production. Results showed substantial activation overlap between speech and non-speech function in regions. Although non-speech gesture production showed greater extent and amplitude of activation in the regions examined, both speech and non-speech showed comparable left laterality in activation for both target perception and production. These findings posit a more general role of the previously proposed "auditory dorsal stream" in the left hemisphere--to support the production of vocal tract gestures that are not limited to speech processing.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Jerry D. Gibson
2016-06-01
Full Text Available Speech compression is a key technology underlying digital cellular communications, VoIP, voicemail, and voice response systems. We trace the evolution of speech coding based on the linear prediction model, highlight the key milestones in speech coding, and outline the structures of the most important speech coding standards. Current challenges, future research directions, fundamental limits on performance, and the critical open problem of speech coding for emergency first responders are all discussed.
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Oueslati, Amel; Salhi-Hannachi, Amel; Luro, François; Vignes, Hélène; Mournet, Pierre; Ollitrault, Patrick
2017-01-01
The mandarin horticultural group is an important component of world citrus production for the fresh fruit market. This group formerly classified as C. reticulata is highly polymorphic and recent molecular studies have suggested that numerous cultivated mandarins were introgressed by C. maxima (the pummelos). C. maxima and C. reticulata are also the ancestors of sweet and sour oranges, grapefruit, and therefore of all the "small citrus" modern varieties (mandarins, tangors, tangelos) derived from sexual hybridization between these horticultural groups. Recently, NGS technologies have greatly modified how plant evolution and genomic structure are analyzed, moving from phylogenetics to phylogenomics. The objective of this work was to develop a workflow for phylogenomic inference from Genotyping By Sequencing (GBS) data and to analyze the interspecific admixture along the nine citrus chromosomes for horticultural groups and recent varieties resulting from the combination of the C. reticulata and C. maxima gene pools. A GBS library was established from 55 citrus varieties, using the ApekI restriction enzyme and selective PCR to improve the read depth. Diagnostic polymorphisms (DPs) of C. reticulata/C. maxima differentiation were identified and used to decipher the phylogenomic structure of the 55 varieties. The GBS approach was powerful and revealed 30,289 SNPs and 8,794 Indels with 12.6% of missing data. 11,133 DPs were selected covering the nine chromosomes with a higher density in genic regions. GBS combined with the detection of DPs was powerful for deciphering the "phylogenomic karyotypes" of cultivars derived from admixture of the two ancestral species after a limited number of interspecific recombinations. All the mandarins, mandarin hybrids, tangelos and tangors analyzed displayed introgression of C. maxima in different parts of the genome. C. reticulata/C. maxima admixture should be a major component of the high phenotypic variability of this germplasm opening
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‘Seedless Kishu’ mandarins (Citrus kinokuni mukakukishu) were treated with gamma irradiation at 150, 400, or 1000 Gy and stored for three weeks at 6°C and then for one week at 20°C to simulate commercial handling and marketing. The quality of the fruit was then evaluated following storage using non-...
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Lai, Wen-Feng; Chen, Yen-Yu
2016-01-01
The aim of this study was to determine the effects of age and family socioeconomic status (SES) on the evaluative language performance of Mandarin-Chinese-speaking young children and their mothers. The participants were 65 mother-child dyads recruited in Taiwan. Thirty-four of these dyads were from middle-class families and 31 were from…
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Measurement of atmospheric contamination by double mandarin (1961)
International Nuclear Information System (INIS)
Billard, F.; Miribel Pradel, J.
1961-01-01
- To check the radioactivity of the air in laboratories where plutonium is handled, an apparatus known as 'Double Mandarin' was devised. This instrument distinguishes plutonium dusts from those which carry natural active deposits, by making use of the granulometric difference between these two types of particle. The separation is based on the use of selective filters placed in series. An electronic unit enables the activities of the dusts collected on the two filters to be measured continuously and immediately. This apparatus is simple in design and should provide a means of checking atmospheric contamination. Its performance is particularly satisfactory in the case of laboratories where the air is filtered. Under these conditions it is possible to detect 70 times the CMA after one minute and 7 times this concentration in 10 minutes. (authors) [fr
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Ren, Yonggang; Wyver, Shirley; Xu Rattanasone, Nan; Demuth, Katherine
2016-01-01
Research Findings: The main aim of this study was to examine whether language skills and emotion regulation are associated with social competence and whether the relationship between English skills and social competence is moderated by emotion regulation in Mandarin-English bilingual preschoolers. The language skills of 96 children ages…
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Hayes-Harb, Rachel; Watzinger-Tharp, Johanna
2012-01-01
We explore the relationship between accentedness and intelligibility, and investigate how listeners' beliefs about nonnative speech interact with their accentedness and intelligibility judgments. Native German speakers and native English learners of German produced German sentences, which were presented to 12 native German speakers in accentedness…
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Self-Repair and Language Selection in Bilingual Speech Processing
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Inga Hennecke
2013-07-01
Full Text Available In psycholinguistic research the exact level of language selection in bilingual lexical access is still controversial and current models of bilingual speech production offer conflicting statements about the mechanisms and location of language selection. This paper aims to provide a corpus analysis of self-repair mechanisms in code-switching contexts of highly fluent bilingual speakers in order to gain further insights into bilingual speech production. The present paper follows the assumptions of the Selection by Proficiency model, which claims that language proficiency and lexical robustness determine the mechanism and level of language selection. In accordance with this hypothesis, highly fluent bilinguals select languages at a prelexical level, which should influence the occurrence of self-repairs in bilingual speech. A corpus of natural speech data of highly fluent and balanced bilingual French-English speakers of the Canadian French variety Franco-Manitoban serves as the basis for a detailed analysis of different self-repair mechanisms in code-switching environments. Although the speech data contain a large amount of code-switching, results reveal that only a few speech errors and self-repairs occur in direct code-switching environments. A detailed analysis of the respective starting point of code-switching and the different repair mechanisms supports the hypothesis that highly proficient bilinguals do not select languages at the lexical level.Le niveau exact de la sélection des langues lors de l’accès lexical chez le bilingue reste une question controversée dans la recherche psycholinguistique. Les modèles actuels de la production verbale bilingue proposent des arguments contradictoires concernant le mécanisme et le lieu de la sélection des langues. La présente recherche vise à fournir une analyse de corpus mettant l’accent sur les mécanismes d’autoréparation dans le contexte d’alternance codique dans la production verbale
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Speech Production and Speech Discrimination by Hearing-Impaired Children.
Novelli-Olmstead, Tina; Ling, Daniel
1984-01-01
Seven hearing impaired children (five to seven years old) assigned to the Speakers group made highly significant gains in speech production and auditory discrimination of speech, while Listeners made only slight speech production gains and no gains in auditory discrimination. Combined speech and auditory training was more effective than auditory…
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Cao, Yuan
2013-01-01
This study enlisted language immersion practitioners in highlighting and exploring the issues and challenges that accompany language immersion education. Comprehensive focused personal interviews of preschool Mandarin Chinese language immersion educators in a private school provided the basis of the study. The research literature reviewed…
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Javad Fatahi Moghadam
2018-03-01
Full Text Available Introduction: According to a breeding program that was carried out in Citrus and Subtropical Fruits Research Center, Noushin (C. reticulata cv Clementine × C. sinensis cv. Salustiana and Shahin (C. reticulata cv Clementine × C. sinensis cv. Hamlin mandarins were released by using crossing method in 20-year program. In general, mandarins do not have the ability of being kept in common or cold storage for long time compared to oranges. The main problem is the change of fruit taste during storage, therefore, it is an attracted subject for researchers. Furthermore, storage temperature plays an important role in the quality of the taste of mandarins. The new released mandarins, which hve not been yet studied completely for their storability, need to be evaluated. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate fruit physico-chemical and sensory characteristics of Noushin and Shahin varieties in common and cold storages for two years. Materials and Methods: In this study, fruits of Noshin and Shahin mandarins were harvested at seasonal harvesting time and then placed in could storage (5 oC and 85% RH and common storage (7-10 oC and 60-70 %RH based on completely randomized design with three replications for 60 days every year. Fruits on days 0 (at harvesting time, 20, 40 and 60 of storage were sampled. Various physico-chemical and sensory characteristics were evaluated including iuice percentage, weight loss, peel color indices (L*, a*, b*, hue angle, chroma and CCI, total soluble solid (TSS, titratable acidity (TA, technological index (TI, skin disorder index (SDI, pH, electrical conductivity (EC, total phenolic, ascorbic acid, antioxidant capacity and sensory parameters during experiment. Statistical analysis of the data was performed using statistical software MSTAT-C. Analysis of variance combined in a randomized complete design (two years with three replications for each variety. Results and Discussion: The results showed that the amount of
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The influence of low dose irradiation on volatile constituents of Imperial and Ellendale mandarins
International Nuclear Information System (INIS)
Wood, A.F.; Mitchell, G.E.; McLauchlan, R.L.; Hammerton, K.
1992-01-01
Volatile compounds were collected from Imperial (Citrus reticulata) and Ellendale (Citrus reticulata/Citrus sinensis hybrid) mandarins, green and degreened, irradiated at 0, 75, and 300 Gy. Thirty-three individual volatile components were isolated, limonene being the major volatile. Irradiation caused only minor changes in the concentrations of some volatiles and the changes were of no value as indicators of irradiation treatment. 18 refs., 3 tabs. 2 figs
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Davidow, Jason H; Grossman, Heather L; Edge, Robin L
2018-05-01
Voluntary stuttering techniques involve persons who stutter purposefully interjecting disfluencies into their speech. Little research has been conducted on the impact of these techniques on the speech pattern of persons who stutter. The present study examined whether changes in the frequency of voluntary stuttering accompanied changes in stuttering frequency, articulation rate, speech naturalness, and speech effort. In total, 12 persons who stutter aged 16-34 years participated. Participants read four 300-syllable passages during a control condition, and three voluntary stuttering conditions that involved attempting to produce purposeful, tension-free repetitions of initial sounds or syllables of a word for two or more repetitions (i.e., bouncing). The three voluntary stuttering conditions included bouncing on 5%, 10%, and 15% of syllables read. Friedman tests and follow-up Wilcoxon signed ranks tests were conducted for the statistical analyses. Stuttering frequency, articulation rate, and speech naturalness were significantly different between the voluntary stuttering conditions. Speech effort did not differ between the voluntary stuttering conditions. Stuttering frequency was significantly lower during the three voluntary stuttering conditions compared to the control condition, and speech effort was significantly lower during two of the three voluntary stuttering conditions compared to the control condition. Due to changes in articulation rate across the voluntary stuttering conditions, it is difficult to conclude, as has been suggested previously, that voluntary stuttering is the reason for stuttering reductions found when using voluntary stuttering techniques. Additionally, future investigations should examine different types of voluntary stuttering over an extended period of time to determine their impact on stuttering frequency, speech rate, speech naturalness, and speech effort.
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Comprehension of synthetic speech and digitized natural speech by adults with aphasia.
Hux, Karen; Knollman-Porter, Kelly; Brown, Jessica; Wallace, Sarah E
2017-09-01
Using text-to-speech technology to provide simultaneous written and auditory content presentation may help compensate for chronic reading challenges if people with aphasia can understand synthetic speech output; however, inherent auditory comprehension challenges experienced by people with aphasia may make understanding synthetic speech difficult. This study's purpose was to compare the preferences and auditory comprehension accuracy of people with aphasia when listening to sentences generated with digitized natural speech, Alex synthetic speech (i.e., Macintosh platform), or David synthetic speech (i.e., Windows platform). The methodology required each of 20 participants with aphasia to select one of four images corresponding in meaning to each of 60 sentences comprising three stimulus sets. Results revealed significantly better accuracy given digitized natural speech than either synthetic speech option; however, individual participant performance analyses revealed three patterns: (a) comparable accuracy regardless of speech condition for 30% of participants, (b) comparable accuracy between digitized natural speech and one, but not both, synthetic speech option for 45% of participants, and (c) greater accuracy with digitized natural speech than with either synthetic speech option for remaining participants. Ranking and Likert-scale rating data revealed a preference for digitized natural speech and David synthetic speech over Alex synthetic speech. Results suggest many individuals with aphasia can comprehend synthetic speech options available on popular operating systems. Further examination of synthetic speech use to support reading comprehension through text-to-speech technology is thus warranted. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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Common neural substrates support speech and non-speech vocal tract gestures
Chang, Soo-Eun; Kenney, Mary Kay; Loucks, Torrey M.J.; Poletto, Christopher J.; Ludlow, Christy L.
2009-01-01
The issue of whether speech is supported by the same neural substrates as non-speech vocal-tract gestures has been contentious. In this fMRI study we tested whether producing non-speech vocal tract gestures in humans shares the same functional neuroanatomy as non-sense speech syllables. Production of non-speech vocal tract gestures, devoid of phonological content but similar to speech in that they had familiar acoustic and somatosensory targets, were compared to the production of speech sylla...
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International Nuclear Information System (INIS)
2001-01-01
This CD is multimedia presentation of programme safety upgrading of Bohunice V1 NPP. This chapter consist of introductory commentary and 4 introductory speeches (video records): (1) Introductory speech of Vincent Pillar, Board chairman and director general of Slovak electric, Plc. (SE); (2) Introductory speech of Stefan Schmidt, director of SE - Bohunice Nuclear power plants; (3) Introductory speech of Jan Korec, Board chairman and director general of VUJE Trnava, Inc. - Engineering, Design and Research Organisation, Trnava; Introductory speech of Dietrich Kuschel, Senior vice-president of FRAMATOME ANP Project and Engineering
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Predicting speech intelligibility in conditions with nonlinearly processed noisy speech
DEFF Research Database (Denmark)
Jørgensen, Søren; Dau, Torsten
2013-01-01
The speech-based envelope power spectrum model (sEPSM; [1]) was proposed in order to overcome the limitations of the classical speech transmission index (STI) and speech intelligibility index (SII). The sEPSM applies the signal-tonoise ratio in the envelope domain (SNRenv), which was demonstrated...... to successfully predict speech intelligibility in conditions with nonlinearly processed noisy speech, such as processing with spectral subtraction. Moreover, a multiresolution version (mr-sEPSM) was demonstrated to account for speech intelligibility in various conditions with stationary and fluctuating...
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Mi, Lin; Tao, Sha; Wang, Wenjing; Dong, Qi; Guan, Jingjing; Liu, Chang
2016-03-01
The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between English vowel identification and English vowel formant discrimination for native Mandarin Chinese- and native English-speaking listeners. The identification of 12 English vowels was measured with the duration cue preserved or removed. The thresholds of vowel formant discrimination on the F2 of two English vowels,/Λ/and/i/, were also estimated using an adaptive-tracking procedure. Native Mandarin Chinese-speaking listeners showed significantly higher thresholds of vowel formant discrimination and lower identification scores than native English-speaking listeners. The duration effect on English vowel identification was similar between native Mandarin Chinese- and native English-speaking listeners. Moreover, regardless of listeners' language background, vowel identification was significantly correlated with vowel formant discrimination for the listeners who were less dependent on duration cues, whereas the correlation between vowel identification and vowel formant discrimination was not significant for the listeners who were highly dependent on duration cues. This study revealed individual variability in using multiple acoustic cues to identify English vowels for both native and non-native listeners. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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Rumbach, Anna F; Rose, Tanya A; Cheah, Mynn
2018-01-29
To explore Australian speech-language pathologists' use of non-speech oral motor exercises, and rationales for using/not using non-speech oral motor exercises in clinical practice. A total of 124 speech-language pathologists practising in Australia, working with paediatric and/or adult clients with speech sound difficulties, completed an online survey. The majority of speech-language pathologists reported that they did not use non-speech oral motor exercises when working with paediatric or adult clients with speech sound difficulties. However, more than half of the speech-language pathologists working with adult clients who have dysarthria reported using non-speech oral motor exercises with this population. The most frequently reported rationale for using non-speech oral motor exercises in speech sound difficulty management was to improve awareness/placement of articulators. The majority of speech-language pathologists agreed there is no clear clinical or research evidence base to support non-speech oral motor exercise use with clients who have speech sound difficulties. This study provides an overview of Australian speech-language pathologists' reported use and perceptions of non-speech oral motor exercises' applicability and efficacy in treating paediatric and adult clients who have speech sound difficulties. The research findings provide speech-language pathologists with insight into how and why non-speech oral motor exercises are currently used, and adds to the knowledge base regarding Australian speech-language pathology practice of non-speech oral motor exercises in the treatment of speech sound difficulties. Implications for Rehabilitation Non-speech oral motor exercises refer to oral motor activities which do not involve speech, but involve the manipulation or stimulation of oral structures including the lips, tongue, jaw, and soft palate. Non-speech oral motor exercises are intended to improve the function (e.g., movement, strength) of oral structures. The
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The intelligibility of Chinese-accented English to Korean and American students at a U.S. university
DEFF Research Database (Denmark)
Hardman, Jocelyn
2017-01-01
This study investigated the intelligibility of Chinese and American graduate students to their Korean and American peers. A psycholinguistic word-recognition-in-noise study investigated the effects on intelligibility of speakers’ L1 and segmental pronunciation accuracy and how this varied...... international and American university students should receive the linguistic perception training necessary to accommodate the range of accent diversity that has become an integral part of academia today. ...
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An investigation of the Android/BadAccents malware which exploits a new Android tapjacking attack
Rasthofer, Siegfried; Asrar, Irfan; Huber, Stephan; Bodden, Eric
2015-01-01
We report on a new threat campaign, underway in Korea, which infected around 20,000 Android users within two months. The campaign attacked mobile users with malicious applications spread via different channels, such as email attachments or SMS spam. A detailed investigation of the Android malware resulted in the identification of a new Android malware family Android/BadAccents. The family represents current state-of-the-art in mobile malware development for banking trojans. In this paper, we ...
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[Improving speech comprehension using a new cochlear implant speech processor].
Müller-Deile, J; Kortmann, T; Hoppe, U; Hessel, H; Morsnowski, A
2009-06-01
The aim of this multicenter clinical field study was to assess the benefits of the new Freedom 24 sound processor for cochlear implant (CI) users implanted with the Nucleus 24 cochlear implant system. The study included 48 postlingually profoundly deaf experienced CI users who demonstrated speech comprehension performance with their current speech processor on the Oldenburg sentence test (OLSA) in quiet conditions of at least 80% correct scores and who were able to perform adaptive speech threshold testing using the OLSA in noisy conditions. Following baseline measures of speech comprehension performance with their current speech processor, subjects were upgraded to the Freedom 24 speech processor. After a take-home trial period of at least 2 weeks, subject performance was evaluated by measuring the speech reception threshold with the Freiburg multisyllabic word test and speech intelligibility with the Freiburg monosyllabic word test at 50 dB and 70 dB in the sound field. The results demonstrated highly significant benefits for speech comprehension with the new speech processor. Significant benefits for speech comprehension were also demonstrated with the new speech processor when tested in competing background noise.In contrast, use of the Abbreviated Profile of Hearing Aid Benefit (APHAB) did not prove to be a suitably sensitive assessment tool for comparative subjective self-assessment of hearing benefits with each processor. Use of the preprocessing algorithm known as adaptive dynamic range optimization (ADRO) in the Freedom 24 led to additional improvements over the standard upgrade map for speech comprehension in quiet and showed equivalent performance in noise. Through use of the preprocessing beam-forming algorithm BEAM, subjects demonstrated a highly significant improved signal-to-noise ratio for speech comprehension thresholds (i.e., signal-to-noise ratio for 50% speech comprehension scores) when tested with an adaptive procedure using the Oldenburg
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Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)
Ravishankar, C., Hughes Network Systems, Germantown, MD
1998-05-08
Speech is the predominant means of communication between human beings and since the invention of the telephone by Alexander Graham Bell in 1876, speech services have remained to be the core service in almost all telecommunication systems. Original analog methods of telephony had the disadvantage of speech signal getting corrupted by noise, cross-talk and distortion Long haul transmissions which use repeaters to compensate for the loss in signal strength on transmission links also increase the associated noise and distortion. On the other hand digital transmission is relatively immune to noise, cross-talk and distortion primarily because of the capability to faithfully regenerate digital signal at each repeater purely based on a binary decision. Hence end-to-end performance of the digital link essentially becomes independent of the length and operating frequency bands of the link Hence from a transmission point of view digital transmission has been the preferred approach due to its higher immunity to noise. The need to carry digital speech became extremely important from a service provision point of view as well. Modem requirements have introduced the need for robust, flexible and secure services that can carry a multitude of signal types (such as voice, data and video) without a fundamental change in infrastructure. Such a requirement could not have been easily met without the advent of digital transmission systems, thereby requiring speech to be coded digitally. The term Speech Coding is often referred to techniques that represent or code speech signals either directly as a waveform or as a set of parameters by analyzing the speech signal. In either case, the codes are transmitted to the distant end where speech is reconstructed or synthesized using the received set of codes. A more generic term that is applicable to these techniques that is often interchangeably used with speech coding is the term voice coding. This term is more generic in the sense that the
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Suebsook, Khwanchanok; Adunyarittigun, Dumrong
2016-01-01
The rise of medical tourism and the increasing number of international patients from Asian countries have led Thai healthcare professionals to serve a lot of Asian patients and to encounter a complexity of language use in their workplace. There is a necessity for these professionals to strive for an understanding of Asian accents spoken by the…
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The analysis of speech acts patterns in two Egyptian inaugural speeches
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Imad Hayif Sameer
2017-09-01
Full Text Available The theory of speech acts, which clarifies what people do when they speak, is not about individual words or sentences that form the basic elements of human communication, but rather about particular speech acts that are performed when uttering words. A speech act is the attempt at doing something purely by speaking. Many things can be done by speaking. Speech acts are studied under what is called speech act theory, and belong to the domain of pragmatics. In this paper, two Egyptian inaugural speeches from El-Sadat and El-Sisi, belonging to different periods were analyzed to find out whether there were differences within this genre in the same culture or not. The study showed that there was a very small difference between these two speeches which were analyzed according to Searle’s theory of speech acts. In El Sadat’s speech, commissives came to occupy the first place. Meanwhile, in El–Sisi’s speech, assertives occupied the first place. Within the speeches of one culture, we can find that the differences depended on the circumstances that surrounded the elections of the Presidents at the time. Speech acts were tools they used to convey what they wanted and to obtain support from their audiences.
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... Staying Safe Videos for Educators Search English Español Speech Problems KidsHealth / For Teens / Speech Problems What's in ... a person's ability to speak clearly. Some Common Speech and Language Disorders Stuttering is a problem that ...
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Alternative Speech Communication System for Persons with Severe Speech Disorders
Selouani, Sid-Ahmed; Sidi Yakoub, Mohammed; O'Shaughnessy, Douglas
2009-12-01
Assistive speech-enabled systems are proposed to help both French and English speaking persons with various speech disorders. The proposed assistive systems use automatic speech recognition (ASR) and speech synthesis in order to enhance the quality of communication. These systems aim at improving the intelligibility of pathologic speech making it as natural as possible and close to the original voice of the speaker. The resynthesized utterances use new basic units, a new concatenating algorithm and a grafting technique to correct the poorly pronounced phonemes. The ASR responses are uttered by the new speech synthesis system in order to convey an intelligible message to listeners. Experiments involving four American speakers with severe dysarthria and two Acadian French speakers with sound substitution disorders (SSDs) are carried out to demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed methods. An improvement of the Perceptual Evaluation of the Speech Quality (PESQ) value of 5% and more than 20% is achieved by the speech synthesis systems that deal with SSD and dysarthria, respectively.
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A Danish open-set speech corpus for competing-speech studies
DEFF Research Database (Denmark)
Nielsen, Jens Bo; Dau, Torsten; Neher, Tobias
2014-01-01
Studies investigating speech-on-speech masking effects commonly use closed-set speech materials such as the coordinate response measure [Bolia et al. (2000). J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 107, 1065-1066]. However, these studies typically result in very low (i.e., negative) speech recognition thresholds (SRTs......) when the competing speech signals are spatially separated. To achieve higher SRTs that correspond more closely to natural communication situations, an open-set, low-context, multi-talker speech corpus was developed. Three sets of 268 unique Danish sentences were created, and each set was recorded...... with one of three professional female talkers. The intelligibility of each sentence in the presence of speech-shaped noise was measured. For each talker, 200 approximately equally intelligible sentences were then selected and systematically distributed into 10 test lists. Test list homogeneity was assessed...
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Speech entrainment enables patients with Broca’s aphasia to produce fluent speech
Hubbard, H. Isabel; Hudspeth, Sarah Grace; Holland, Audrey L.; Bonilha, Leonardo; Fromm, Davida; Rorden, Chris
2012-01-01
A distinguishing feature of Broca’s aphasia is non-fluent halting speech typically involving one to three words per utterance. Yet, despite such profound impairments, some patients can mimic audio-visual speech stimuli enabling them to produce fluent speech in real time. We call this effect ‘speech entrainment’ and reveal its neural mechanism as well as explore its usefulness as a treatment for speech production in Broca’s aphasia. In Experiment 1, 13 patients with Broca’s aphasia were tested in three conditions: (i) speech entrainment with audio-visual feedback where they attempted to mimic a speaker whose mouth was seen on an iPod screen; (ii) speech entrainment with audio-only feedback where patients mimicked heard speech; and (iii) spontaneous speech where patients spoke freely about assigned topics. The patients produced a greater variety of words using audio-visual feedback compared with audio-only feedback and spontaneous speech. No difference was found between audio-only feedback and spontaneous speech. In Experiment 2, 10 of the 13 patients included in Experiment 1 and 20 control subjects underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging to determine the neural mechanism that supports speech entrainment. Group results with patients and controls revealed greater bilateral cortical activation for speech produced during speech entrainment compared with spontaneous speech at the junction of the anterior insula and Brodmann area 47, in Brodmann area 37, and unilaterally in the left middle temporal gyrus and the dorsal portion of Broca’s area. Probabilistic white matter tracts constructed for these regions in the normal subjects revealed a structural network connected via the corpus callosum and ventral fibres through the extreme capsule. Unilateral areas were connected via the arcuate fasciculus. In Experiment 3, all patients included in Experiment 1 participated in a 6-week treatment phase using speech entrainment to improve speech production
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Multimodal Speech Capture System for Speech Rehabilitation and Learning.
Sebkhi, Nordine; Desai, Dhyey; Islam, Mohammad; Lu, Jun; Wilson, Kimberly; Ghovanloo, Maysam
2017-11-01
Speech-language pathologists (SLPs) are trained to correct articulation of people diagnosed with motor speech disorders by analyzing articulators' motion and assessing speech outcome while patients speak. To assist SLPs in this task, we are presenting the multimodal speech capture system (MSCS) that records and displays kinematics of key speech articulators, the tongue and lips, along with voice, using unobtrusive methods. Collected speech modalities, tongue motion, lips gestures, and voice are visualized not only in real-time to provide patients with instant feedback but also offline to allow SLPs to perform post-analysis of articulators' motion, particularly the tongue, with its prominent but hardly visible role in articulation. We describe the MSCS hardware and software components, and demonstrate its basic visualization capabilities by a healthy individual repeating the words "Hello World." A proof-of-concept prototype has been successfully developed for this purpose, and will be used in future clinical studies to evaluate its potential impact on accelerating speech rehabilitation by enabling patients to speak naturally. Pattern matching algorithms to be applied to the collected data can provide patients with quantitative and objective feedback on their speech performance, unlike current methods that are mostly subjective, and may vary from one SLP to another.
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van Lieshout, Pascal H. H. M.; Bose, Arpita; Square, Paula A.; Steele, Catriona M.
2007-01-01
Apraxia of speech (AOS) is typically described as a motor-speech disorder with clinically well-defined symptoms, but without a clear understanding of the underlying problems in motor control. A number of studies have compared the speech of subjects with AOS to the fluent speech of controls, but only a few have included speech movement data and if…
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Determining Appropriate Harvesting Date and Storage Life of Kinnow Mandarine Fruits in Jiroft County
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Seied Mehdi Miri
2018-02-01
Full Text Available Introduction. Citrus is one of the most commercially important horticultural crops grown in tropical and sub-tropical regions of the world. They are classified as non-climacteric fruits. Harvesting date and storage can influence citrus fruit quality and shelf life. In Iran, some members of citrus family including sweet orange and mandarin are produced as an export crop, so research on fruit quality and storage life is needed. There is no available scientific literature regarding the effect of harvesting date and storage duration on retaining the postharvest physicochemical properties of Kinnow mandarin under cold storage. The main objective of the present study was to evaluate the effect of harvesting date and storing time on shelf life and quality of Kinnow mandarin fruits under Jiroft weather conditions. Materials and Methods. Investigations were carried out on mandarin (Citrus reticulata cv. Kinnow grafted on sour orange rootstock in an orchard located in Jiroft and Kahnooj Agricultural Research Center, Jiroft, Iran. Fruits were harvested on 6th December, 21th December, 5th January, 20th January and 4th February. After cold storage for 30-90 days at 4-6 °C, the fruit was analyzed for quantitative and qualitative characteristics including weight of fruit, peel, meat, pulp and juice, fruit weight loss, pH, total soluble solids (TSS, titratable acidity (TA and TSS/TA. Experiment was arranged in a split plot based on randomized complete block design (RCBD. Data analysis and similarity coefficient (Pearson's method were performed using SPSS.16 software, and means comparison was performed by using Duncan's multiple range test at 1 and 5% probability levels. Results and Discussion. The results showed that the interaction effect of harvesting date and storage period on the weight of the fruit, meat, pulp and juice and TSS, TA and TSS/TA was significant at 1% probability level. Weight of harvested fruits from 6th December to 5th January was constant
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Zhang, Yan; Guo, Yan
2017-01-01
Chinese children of immigrant families are often perceived as good at memorization and rote learning or as polite, obedient, and passive students lacking creativity and criticality. Guided by Multiple Literacies Theory and translanguaging, this study explores how Chinese children in a Mandarin-English bilingual program skillfully navigate…
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Hidden Markov modeling of frequency-following responses to Mandarin lexical tones.
Llanos, Fernando; Xie, Zilong; Chandrasekaran, Bharath
2017-11-01
The frequency-following response (FFR) is a scalp-recorded electrophysiological potential reflecting phase-locked activity from neural ensembles in the auditory system. The FFR is often used to assess the robustness of subcortical pitch processing. Due to low signal-to-noise ratio at the single-trial level, FFRs are typically averaged across thousands of stimulus repetitions. Prior work using this approach has shown that subcortical encoding of linguistically-relevant pitch patterns is modulated by long-term language experience. We examine the extent to which a machine learning approach using hidden Markov modeling (HMM) can be utilized to decode Mandarin tone-categories from scalp-record electrophysiolgical activity. We then assess the extent to which the HMM can capture biologically-relevant effects (language experience-driven plasticity). To this end, we recorded FFRs to four Mandarin tones from 14 adult native speakers of Chinese and 14 of native English. We trained a HMM to decode tone categories from the FFRs with varying size of averages. Tone categories were decoded with above-chance accuracies using HMM. The HMM derived metric (decoding accuracy) revealed a robust effect of language experience, such that FFRs from native Chinese speakers yielded greater accuracies than native English speakers. Critically, the language experience-driven plasticity was captured with average sizes significantly smaller than those used in the extant literature. Our results demonstrate the feasibility of HMM in assessing the robustness of neural pitch. Machine-learning approaches can complement extant analytical methods that capture auditory function and could reduce the number of trials needed to capture biological phenomena. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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Enhancement of speech signals - with a focus on voiced speech models
DEFF Research Database (Denmark)
Nørholm, Sidsel Marie
This thesis deals with speech enhancement, i.e., noise reduction in speech signals. This has applications in, e.g., hearing aids and teleconference systems. We consider a signal-driven approach to speech enhancement where a model of the speech is assumed and filters are generated based...... on this model. The basic model used in this thesis is the harmonic model which is a commonly used model for describing the voiced part of the speech signal. We show that it can be beneficial to extend the model to take inharmonicities or the non-stationarity of speech into account. Extending the model...
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Intelligibility for Binaural Speech with Discarded Low-SNR Speech Components.
Schoenmaker, Esther; van de Par, Steven
2016-01-01
Speech intelligibility in multitalker settings improves when the target speaker is spatially separated from the interfering speakers. A factor that may contribute to this improvement is the improved detectability of target-speech components due to binaural interaction in analogy to the Binaural Masking Level Difference (BMLD). This would allow listeners to hear target speech components within specific time-frequency intervals that have a negative SNR, similar to the improvement in the detectability of a tone in noise when these contain disparate interaural difference cues. To investigate whether these negative-SNR target-speech components indeed contribute to speech intelligibility, a stimulus manipulation was performed where all target components were removed when local SNRs were smaller than a certain criterion value. It can be expected that for sufficiently high criterion values target speech components will be removed that do contribute to speech intelligibility. For spatially separated speakers, assuming that a BMLD-like detection advantage contributes to intelligibility, degradation in intelligibility is expected already at criterion values below 0 dB SNR. However, for collocated speakers it is expected that higher criterion values can be applied without impairing speech intelligibility. Results show that degradation of intelligibility for separated speakers is only seen for criterion values of 0 dB and above, indicating a negligible contribution of a BMLD-like detection advantage in multitalker settings. These results show that the spatial benefit is related to a spatial separation of speech components at positive local SNRs rather than to a BMLD-like detection improvement for speech components at negative local SNRs.
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An experimental Dutch keyboard-to-speech system for the speech impaired
Deliege, R.J.H.
1989-01-01
An experimental Dutch keyboard-to-speech system has been developed to explor the possibilities and limitations of Dutch speech synthesis in a communication aid for the speech impaired. The system uses diphones and a formant synthesizer chip for speech synthesis. Input to the system is in
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Speech Function and Speech Role in Carl Fredricksen's Dialogue on Up Movie
Rehana, Ridha; Silitonga, Sortha
2013-01-01
One aim of this article is to show through a concrete example how speech function and speech role used in movie. The illustrative example is taken from the dialogue of Up movie. Central to the analysis proper form of dialogue on Up movie that contain of speech function and speech role; i.e. statement, offer, question, command, giving, and demanding. 269 dialogue were interpreted by actor, and it was found that the use of speech function and speech role.
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Processing of Scalar Inferences by Mandarin Learners of English: An Online Measure.
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Yowyu Lin
Full Text Available Scalar inferences represent the condition when a speaker uses a weaker expression such as some in a pragmatic scale like , and s/he has the intention to reject the stronger use of the other word like all in the utterance. Considerable disagreement has arisen concerning how interlocutors derive the inferences. The study presented here tries to address this issue by examining online scalar inferences among Mandarin learners of English. To date, Default Inference and Relevance Theory have made different predictions regarding how people process scalar inferences. Findings from recently emerging first language studies did not fully resolved the debate but led to even more heated debates. The current three online psycholinguistic experiments reported here tried to address the processing of scalar inferences from second language perspective. Results showed that Mandarin learners of English showed faster reaction times and a higher acceptance rate when interpreting some as some but not all and this was true even when subjects were under time pressure, which was manifested in Experiment 2. Overall, the results of the experiments supported Default Theory. In addition, Experiment 3 also found that working memory capacity plays a critical role during scalar inference processing. High span readers were faster in accepting the some but not all interpretation than low span readers. However, compared with low span readers, high span readers were more likely to accept the some and possibly all condition, possibly due to their working memory capacity to generate scenarios to fit the interpretation.
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Larm, Petra; Hongisto, Valtteri
2006-02-01
During the acoustical design of, e.g., auditoria or open-plan offices, it is important to know how speech can be perceived in various parts of the room. Different objective methods have been developed to measure and predict speech intelligibility, and these have been extensively used in various spaces. In this study, two such methods were compared, the speech transmission index (STI) and the speech intelligibility index (SII). Also the simplification of the STI, the room acoustics speech transmission index (RASTI), was considered. These quantities are all based on determining an apparent speech-to-noise ratio on selected frequency bands and summing them using a specific weighting. For comparison, some data were needed on the possible differences of these methods resulting from the calculation scheme and also measuring equipment. Their prediction accuracy was also of interest. Measurements were made in a laboratory having adjustable noise level and absorption, and in a real auditorium. It was found that the measurement equipment, especially the selection of the loudspeaker, can greatly affect the accuracy of the results. The prediction accuracy of the RASTI was found acceptable, if the input values for the prediction are accurately known, even though the studied space was not ideally diffuse.
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Robust Speech/Non-Speech Classification in Heterogeneous Multimedia Content
Huijbregts, M.A.H.; de Jong, Franciska M.G.
In this paper we present a speech/non-speech classification method that allows high quality classification without the need to know in advance what kinds of audible non-speech events are present in an audio recording and that does not require a single parameter to be tuned on in-domain data. Because
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de Jong, Marjan; Lucas, Cees; Bredero, Hansje; van Adrichem, Leon; Tibboel, Dick; van Dijk, Monique
2012-01-01
de jong m., lucas c., bredero h., van adrichem l., tibboel d. & van dijk m. (2011) Does postoperative M technique (R) massage with or without mandarin oil reduce infants distress after major craniofacial surgery? Journal of Advanced Nursing68(6), 17481757. Abstract Aim. This article is a report of a
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Intelligibility of speech of children with speech and sound disorders
Ivetac, Tina
2014-01-01
The purpose of this study is to examine speech intelligibility of children with primary speech and sound disorders aged 3 to 6 years in everyday life. The research problem is based on the degree to which parents or guardians, immediate family members (sister, brother, grandparents), extended family members (aunt, uncle, cousin), child's friends, other acquaintances, child's teachers and strangers understand the speech of children with speech sound disorders. We examined whether the level ...
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... disorder; Voice disorders; Vocal disorders; Disfluency; Communication disorder - speech disorder; Speech disorder - stuttering ... evaluation tools that can help identify and diagnose speech disorders: Denver Articulation Screening Examination Goldman-Fristoe Test of ...
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Bouwer, F.L.
2016-01-01
In this dissertation, I examine beat perception, the process that allows us to make music together. I explore the effects of attention, musical abilities, and accents on beat perception. Additionally, I address several methodological issues that arise when probing beat perception with event-related
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Neurophysiology of speech differences in childhood apraxia of speech.
Preston, Jonathan L; Molfese, Peter J; Gumkowski, Nina; Sorcinelli, Andrea; Harwood, Vanessa; Irwin, Julia R; Landi, Nicole
2014-01-01
Event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded during a picture naming task of simple and complex words in children with typical speech and with childhood apraxia of speech (CAS). Results reveal reduced amplitude prior to speaking complex (multisyllabic) words relative to simple (monosyllabic) words for the CAS group over the right hemisphere during a time window thought to reflect phonological encoding of word forms. Group differences were also observed prior to production of spoken tokens regardless of word complexity during a time window just prior to speech onset (thought to reflect motor planning/programming). Results suggest differences in pre-speech neurolinguistic processes.
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Non-native Listeners’ Recognition of High-Variability Speech Using PRESTO
Tamati, Terrin N.; Pisoni, David B.
2015-01-01
Background Natural variability in speech is a significant challenge to robust successful spoken word recognition. In everyday listening environments, listeners must quickly adapt and adjust to multiple sources of variability in both the signal and listening environments. High-variability speech may be particularly difficult to understand for non-native listeners, who have less experience with the second language (L2) phonological system and less detailed knowledge of sociolinguistic variation of the L2. Purpose The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of high-variability sentences on non-native speech recognition and to explore the underlying sources of individual differences in speech recognition abilities of non-native listeners. Research Design Participants completed two sentence recognition tasks involving high-variability and low-variability sentences. They also completed a battery of behavioral tasks and self-report questionnaires designed to assess their indexical processing skills, vocabulary knowledge, and several core neurocognitive abilities. Study Sample Native speakers of Mandarin (n = 25) living in the United States recruited from the Indiana University community participated in the current study. A native comparison group consisted of scores obtained from native speakers of English (n = 21) in the Indiana University community taken from an earlier study. Data Collection and Analysis Speech recognition in high-variability listening conditions was assessed with a sentence recognition task using sentences from PRESTO (Perceptually Robust English Sentence Test Open-Set) mixed in 6-talker multitalker babble. Speech recognition in low-variability listening conditions was assessed using sentences from HINT (Hearing In Noise Test) mixed in 6-talker multitalker babble. Indexical processing skills were measured using a talker discrimination task, a gender discrimination task, and a forced-choice regional dialect categorization task. Vocabulary
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Listeners Experience Linguistic Masking Release in Noise-Vocoded Speech-in-Speech Recognition
Viswanathan, Navin; Kokkinakis, Kostas; Williams, Brittany T.
2018-01-01
Purpose: The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether listeners with normal hearing perceiving noise-vocoded speech-in-speech demonstrate better intelligibility of target speech when the background speech was mismatched in language (linguistic release from masking [LRM]) and/or location (spatial release from masking [SRM]) relative to the…
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Investigation on Mandarin Broadcast News Speech Recognition
National Research Council Canada - National Science Library
Hwang, Mei-Yuh; Lei, Xin; Wang, Wen; Shinozaki, Takahiro
2006-01-01
.... Their final system achieved a 6.0% character error rate (CER) on dev04 and a 16.0% CER on eval04 with simpler acoustic models, less training data, and simpler decoding architecture compared with other state-of-the-art systems...
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Speech Perception and Short-Term Memory Deficits in Persistent Developmental Speech Disorder
Kenney, Mary Kay; Barac-Cikoja, Dragana; Finnegan, Kimberly; Jeffries, Neal; Ludlow, Christy L.
2006-01-01
Children with developmental speech disorders may have additional deficits in speech perception and/or short-term memory. To determine whether these are only transient developmental delays that can accompany the disorder in childhood or persist as part of the speech disorder, adults with a persistent familial speech disorder were tested on speech…
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Automatic speech recognition (ASR) based approach for speech therapy of aphasic patients: A review
Jamal, Norezmi; Shanta, Shahnoor; Mahmud, Farhanahani; Sha'abani, MNAH
2017-09-01
This paper reviews the state-of-the-art an automatic speech recognition (ASR) based approach for speech therapy of aphasic patients. Aphasia is a condition in which the affected person suffers from speech and language disorder resulting from a stroke or brain injury. Since there is a growing body of evidence indicating the possibility of improving the symptoms at an early stage, ASR based solutions are increasingly being researched for speech and language therapy. ASR is a technology that transfers human speech into transcript text by matching with the system's library. This is particularly useful in speech rehabilitation therapies as they provide accurate, real-time evaluation for speech input from an individual with speech disorder. ASR based approaches for speech therapy recognize the speech input from the aphasic patient and provide real-time feedback response to their mistakes. However, the accuracy of ASR is dependent on many factors such as, phoneme recognition, speech continuity, speaker and environmental differences as well as our depth of knowledge on human language understanding. Hence, the review examines recent development of ASR technologies and its performance for individuals with speech and language disorders.
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... OTC Relief for Diarrhea Home Diseases and Conditions Speech and Language Delay Condition Speech and Language Delay Share Print Table of Contents1. ... Treatment6. Everyday Life7. Questions8. Resources What is a speech and language delay? A speech and language delay ...
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Chen, Pei-Hua; Liu, Ting-Wei
2017-01-01
Telepractice provides an alternative form of auditory-verbal therapy (eAVT) intervention through videoconferencing; this can be of immense benefit for children with hearing loss, especially those living in rural or remote areas. The effectiveness of eAVT for the language development of Mandarin-speaking preschoolers with hearing loss was…
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Plasticity in the Human Speech Motor System Drives Changes in Speech Perception
Lametti, Daniel R.; Rochet-Capellan, Amélie; Neufeld, Emily; Shiller, Douglas M.
2014-01-01
Recent studies of human speech motor learning suggest that learning is accompanied by changes in auditory perception. But what drives the perceptual change? Is it a consequence of changes in the motor system? Or is it a result of sensory inflow during learning? Here, subjects participated in a speech motor-learning task involving adaptation to altered auditory feedback and they were subsequently tested for perceptual change. In two separate experiments, involving two different auditory perceptual continua, we show that changes in the speech motor system that accompany learning drive changes in auditory speech perception. Specifically, we obtained changes in speech perception when adaptation to altered auditory feedback led to speech production that fell into the phonetic range of the speech perceptual tests. However, a similar change in perception was not observed when the auditory feedback that subjects' received during learning fell into the phonetic range of the perceptual tests. This indicates that the central motor outflow associated with vocal sensorimotor adaptation drives changes to the perceptual classification of speech sounds. PMID:25080594
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Ivanovi?, ?arko; Perovi?, Tatjana; Popovi?, Tatjana; Blagojevi?, Jovana; Trkulja, Nenad; Hrn?i?, Snje?ana
2017-01-01
Citrus blast caused by bacterium Pseudomonas syringae is a very important disease of citrus occuring in many areas of the world, but with few data about genetic structure of the pathogen involved. Considering the above fact, this study reports genetic characterization of 43 P. syringae isolates obtained from plant tissue displaying citrus blast symptoms on mandarin (Citrus reticulata) in Montenegro, using multilocus sequence analysis of gyrB, rpoD, and gap1 gene sequences. Gene sequences from...
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Childhood apraxia of speech: A survey of praxis and typical speech characteristics.
Malmenholt, Ann; Lohmander, Anette; McAllister, Anita
2017-07-01
The purpose of this study was to investigate current knowledge of the diagnosis childhood apraxia of speech (CAS) in Sweden and compare speech characteristics and symptoms to those of earlier survey findings in mainly English-speakers. In a web-based questionnaire 178 Swedish speech-language pathologists (SLPs) anonymously answered questions about their perception of typical speech characteristics for CAS. They graded own assessment skills and estimated clinical occurrence. The seven top speech characteristics reported as typical for children with CAS were: inconsistent speech production (85%), sequencing difficulties (71%), oro-motor deficits (63%), vowel errors (62%), voicing errors (61%), consonant cluster deletions (54%), and prosodic disturbance (53%). Motor-programming deficits described as lack of automatization of speech movements were perceived by 82%. All listed characteristics were consistent with the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) consensus-based features, Strand's 10-point checklist, and the diagnostic model proposed by Ozanne. The mode for clinical occurrence was 5%. Number of suspected cases of CAS in the clinical caseload was approximately one new patient/year and SLP. The results support and add to findings from studies of CAS in English-speaking children with similar speech characteristics regarded as typical. Possibly, these findings could contribute to cross-linguistic consensus on CAS characteristics.
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Single cell protein from mandarin orange peel
Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)
Mishio, M.; Magai, J.
1981-01-01
As the hydrolysis of mandarin orange peel with macerating enzyme (40 degrees C, 24 h) produced 0.59 g g-1 reducing sugar per dry peel compared to 0.36 by acid-hydrolysis (15 min at 120 degrees C with 0.8 N H2S04), the production of single cell protein (SCP) from orange peel was studied mostly using enzymatically hydrolyzed orange peel. When the enzymatically hydrolyzed peel media were used, the utilization efficiency of reducing sugars (%) and the growth yield from reducing sugars (g g-1) were: 63 and 0.51 for Saccharomyces cerevisiae; 56 and 0.48 for Candida utilis; 74 and 0.69 for Debaryomyces hansenii and 64 and 0.70 for Rhodotorula glutinis. SCP production from orange peel by D. hansenii and R. glutinis were further studied. Batch cultures for 24 h at 30 degrees C using 100g dried orange peel produced 45 g of dried cultivated peel (protein content, 33%) with D. hansenii and 34 g (protein content, 50%) with R. glutinis, and 38 g (protein content, 44%) with a mixture of both yeasts. (Refs. 12).
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Speech-specific audiovisual perception affects identification but not detection of speech
DEFF Research Database (Denmark)
Eskelund, Kasper; Andersen, Tobias
Speech perception is audiovisual as evidenced by the McGurk effect in which watching incongruent articulatory mouth movements can change the phonetic auditory speech percept. This type of audiovisual integration may be specific to speech or be applied to all stimuli in general. To investigate...... of audiovisual integration specific to speech perception. However, the results of Tuomainen et al. might have been influenced by another effect. When observers were naïve, they had little motivation to look at the face. When informed, they knew that the face was relevant for the task and this could increase...... visual detection task. In our first experiment, observers presented with congruent and incongruent audiovisual sine-wave speech stimuli did only show a McGurk effect when informed of the speech nature of the stimulus. Performance on the secondary visual task was very good, thus supporting the finding...
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Performance of ‘Okitsu’ satsuma mandarin trees on different rootstocks in Northwestern Parana State
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Zuleide Hissano Tazima
2014-10-01
Full Text Available In the State of Paraná, citrus production is based mainly on Rangpur lime rootstock, which has good results with the established cultivars. However, research is needed into rootstocks for use with cultivars that remain to be commercially exploited. The objective of this study was to evaluate the vegetative development and yield of ‘Okitsu’ satsuma mandarin plants (Citrus unshiu Marc., as well as fruit quality, budded on nine rootstocks in the Northwest State of Paraná, Brazil. The orchard was established at the Experimental Station of the Agronomic Institute of Paraná-IAPAR, Paranavaí, PR, in January 2001. The experimental design was randomized blocks with nine treatments, three replications, and two plants per plot. The rootstocks were Rangpur lime (Citrus limonia Osb., Cleopatra mandarin (Citrus reshni hort. ex Tanaka, C-13 citrange [Citrus sinensis × Poncirus trifoliata orange (L. Raf.], Volkamer lemon (Citrus volkameriana V. Ten. e Pasq., Carrizo citrange [C. sinensis × P. trifoliata (L. Raf.], Sunki mandarin (Citrus sunki hort. ex Tanaka, trifoliate orange [P. trifoliata (L. Raf. ], Swingle citrumelo [Citrus paradisi Macfad. cv. Duncan × P. trifoliata (L. Raf.], and Caipira DAC sweet orange [C. sinensis (L. Osb.]. The largest plant canopy to ‘Okitsu’ was induced by Cleopatra and the lowest by trifoliata, with 37.1 m3 and 9.9 m3, respectively. The highest relationship between scion and rootstock trunk diameter was observed for the plants budded on Swingle. The largest accumulated yields per plant over eight seasons were induced by Volkamer, Rangpur, Caipira DAC, Cleopatra, and Carrizo, ranging from 867.3 to 989.6 kg. These rootstocks also induced the largest fruit mass, along with Sunki, ranging from 173.3 to 188.0 g. Trifoliate induced accumulated production of 52.5% in relation to Rangpur lime. Rangpur, Carrizo, trifoliate, and Swingle induced the largest averages for the ratio, ranging from 10.41 to 10.79. For orchard
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Speech-Language Therapy (For Parents)
... Staying Safe Videos for Educators Search English Español Speech-Language Therapy KidsHealth / For Parents / Speech-Language Therapy ... most kids with speech and/or language disorders. Speech Disorders, Language Disorders, and Feeding Disorders A speech ...
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Chung, Wei-Lun; Jarmulowicz, Linda
2017-08-01
For monolingual English-speaking children, judgment and production of stress in derived words, including words with phonologically neutral (e.g., -ness) and non-neutral suffixes (e.g., -ity), is important to both academic vocabulary growth and to word reading. For Mandarin-speaking adult English learners (AELs) the challenge of learning the English stress system might be complicated by cross-linguistic differences in prosodic function and features. As Mandarin-speakers become more proficient in English, patterns similar to those seen in monolingual children could emerge in which awareness and use of stress and suffix cues benefit word reading. A correlational design was used to examine the contributions of English stress in derivation with neutral and non-neutral suffixes to English word and nonword reading. Stress judgment in non-neutral derivation predicted word reading after controlling for working memory and English vocabulary; whereas stress production in neutral derivation contributed to word reading and pseudoword decoding, independent of working memory and English vocabulary. Although AELs could use stress and suffix cues for word reading, AELs were different from native English speakers in awareness of non-neutral suffix cues conditioning lexical stress placement. AELs may need to rely on lexical storage of primary stress in derivations with non-neutral suffixes.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Alicia Menendez Martinez
2013-07-01
Full Text Available La arquitectay diseñadora asturiana, afincada en Milán, Patricia Urquiola despliega en la obrade interiorismo integral realizada en el Hotel Mandarin Oriental de Barcelonaun universo de piezas y ambientes que permite un acercamiento al diseño másinternacional del siglo XXI. A través de este artículo, se pretende analizar lagran escenografía de lujo contenido que ha conseguido la autora y lasconsideraciones sobre diseño contemporáneo que salen al paso de este análisis.Conceptos como buen gusto, continuidad, refinamiento, esencialidad,sensibilidad o delicadeza se unen al de femineidad para volverse una constantea lo largo de estas páginas. El trabajo realizado por Urquiola en esteequipamiento hotelero de gran lujo pone de manifiesto su irrupción por méritospropios en el mundo del diseño contemporáneo internacional y la encumbra comoartista polifacética y multidisciplinar preparada para amoldarse a las másaltas exigencias del mercado. El interiorismo del Mandarin es la prueba de queUrquiola ha llegado a lo más alto para quedarse. A su formación hispano-italianase añade un punto de vista sorprendentemente nuevo, el de una mujer diseñadora.
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Digital speech processing using Matlab
Gopi, E S
2014-01-01
Digital Speech Processing Using Matlab deals with digital speech pattern recognition, speech production model, speech feature extraction, and speech compression. The book is written in a manner that is suitable for beginners pursuing basic research in digital speech processing. Matlab illustrations are provided for most topics to enable better understanding of concepts. This book also deals with the basic pattern recognition techniques (illustrated with speech signals using Matlab) such as PCA, LDA, ICA, SVM, HMM, GMM, BPN, and KSOM.
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Developmental apraxia of speech in children. Quantitive assessment of speech characteristics
Thoonen, G.H.J.
1998-01-01
Developmental apraxia of speech (DAS) in children is a speech disorder, supposed to have a neurological origin, which is commonly considered to result from particular deficits in speech processing (i.e., phonological planning, motor programming). However, the label DAS has often been used as
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Greene, Beth G; Logan, John S; Pisoni, David B
1986-03-01
We present the results of studies designed to measure the segmental intelligibility of eight text-to-speech systems and a natural speech control, using the Modified Rhyme Test (MRT). Results indicated that the voices tested could be grouped into four categories: natural speech, high-quality synthetic speech, moderate-quality synthetic speech, and low-quality synthetic speech. The overall performance of the best synthesis system, DECtalk-Paul, was equivalent to natural speech only in terms of performance on initial consonants. The findings are discussed in terms of recent work investigating the perception of synthetic speech under more severe conditions. Suggestions for future research on improving the quality of synthetic speech are also considered.
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GREENE, BETH G.; LOGAN, JOHN S.; PISONI, DAVID B.
2012-01-01
We present the results of studies designed to measure the segmental intelligibility of eight text-to-speech systems and a natural speech control, using the Modified Rhyme Test (MRT). Results indicated that the voices tested could be grouped into four categories: natural speech, high-quality synthetic speech, moderate-quality synthetic speech, and low-quality synthetic speech. The overall performance of the best synthesis system, DECtalk-Paul, was equivalent to natural speech only in terms of performance on initial consonants. The findings are discussed in terms of recent work investigating the perception of synthetic speech under more severe conditions. Suggestions for future research on improving the quality of synthetic speech are also considered. PMID:23225916
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The speech perception skills of children with and without speech sound disorder.
Hearnshaw, Stephanie; Baker, Elise; Munro, Natalie
To investigate whether Australian-English speaking children with and without speech sound disorder (SSD) differ in their overall speech perception accuracy. Additionally, to investigate differences in the perception of specific phonemes and the association between speech perception and speech production skills. Twenty-five Australian-English speaking children aged 48-60 months participated in this study. The SSD group included 12 children and the typically developing (TD) group included 13 children. Children completed routine speech and language assessments in addition to an experimental Australian-English lexical and phonetic judgement task based on Rvachew's Speech Assessment and Interactive Learning System (SAILS) program (Rvachew, 2009). This task included eight words across four word-initial phonemes-/k, ɹ, ʃ, s/. Children with SSD showed significantly poorer perceptual accuracy on the lexical and phonetic judgement task compared with TD peers. The phonemes /ɹ/ and /s/ were most frequently perceived in error across both groups. Additionally, the phoneme /ɹ/ was most commonly produced in error. There was also a positive correlation between overall speech perception and speech production scores. Children with SSD perceived speech less accurately than their typically developing peers. The findings suggest that an Australian-English variation of a lexical and phonetic judgement task similar to the SAILS program is promising and worthy of a larger scale study. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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DEFF Research Database (Denmark)
Hasse Jørgensen, Stina
2011-01-01
About Speech Matters - Katarina Gregos, the Greek curator's exhibition at the Danish Pavillion, the Venice Biannual 2011.......About Speech Matters - Katarina Gregos, the Greek curator's exhibition at the Danish Pavillion, the Venice Biannual 2011....
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Native Speakers' Perception of Non-Native English Speech
Jaber, Maysa; Hussein, Riyad F.
2011-01-01
This study is aimed at investigating the rating and intelligibility of different non-native varieties of English, namely French English, Japanese English and Jordanian English by native English speakers and their attitudes towards these foreign accents. To achieve the goals of this study, the researchers used a web-based questionnaire which…
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Anne Birgitta Nilsen
2014-12-01
Full Text Available The manifesto of the Norwegian terrorist Anders Behring Breivik is based on the “Eurabia” conspiracy theory. This theory is a key starting point for hate speech amongst many right-wing extremists in Europe, but also has ramifications beyond these environments. In brief, proponents of the Eurabia theory claim that Muslims are occupying Europe and destroying Western culture, with the assistance of the EU and European governments. By contrast, members of Al-Qaeda and other extreme Islamists promote the conspiracy theory “the Crusade” in their hate speech directed against the West. Proponents of the latter theory argue that the West is leading a crusade to eradicate Islam and Muslims, a crusade that is similarly facilitated by their governments. This article presents analyses of texts written by right-wing extremists and Muslim extremists in an effort to shed light on how hate speech promulgates conspiracy theories in order to spread hatred and intolerance.The aim of the article is to contribute to a more thorough understanding of hate speech’s nature by applying rhetorical analysis. Rhetorical analysis is chosen because it offers a means of understanding the persuasive power of speech. It is thus a suitable tool to describe how hate speech works to convince and persuade. The concepts from rhetorical theory used in this article are ethos, logos and pathos. The concept of ethos is used to pinpoint factors that contributed to Osama bin Laden's impact, namely factors that lent credibility to his promotion of the conspiracy theory of the Crusade. In particular, Bin Laden projected common sense, good morals and good will towards his audience. He seemed to have coherent and relevant arguments; he appeared to possess moral credibility; and his use of language demonstrated that he wanted the best for his audience.The concept of pathos is used to define hate speech, since hate speech targets its audience's emotions. In hate speech it is the
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
M. Ghosh
2005-01-01
Full Text Available The objective of this study was to assess the microbiological safety of Kinnow-mandarins (Citrus nobilis X Citrus deliciosa used for preparation of fresh squeezed juices by street vendors. One hundred and fifty Kinnow mandarin samples were collected from different points in the distribution chain from the same lot, washed and aliquots of the wash samples were analyzed for total aerobes, Staphylococcus, total and fecal coliforms, Salmonella and Shigella. Although, there was no notable increase in the total aerobic, total or fecal coliform counts, total staphylococcal counts increased significantly (P<0.05 during distribution to street vendors; seventy-two samples from the street vendors showed the presence of coagulase positive Staphylococcus aureus, twenty-three of these produced enterotoxins B and C. Salmonella and Shigella were not detected in any of the samples. Sources of high numbers of enterotoxigenic S. aureus were traced to unhygienic manual handling by middle level buyers and by street vendors. The results of our study demonstrate the poor microbiological quality of Kinnow-mandarins, the possible entry points of contaminants in the distribution chain of these fruits and unhygienic vending practices. Appropriate intervention measures are needed to ensure safe fresh squeezed juices for consumers.
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Iuzzini-Seigel, Jenya; Hogan, Tiffany P.; Green, Jordan R.
2017-01-01
Purpose: The current research sought to determine (a) if speech inconsistency is a core feature of childhood apraxia of speech (CAS) or if it is driven by comorbid language impairment that affects a large subset of children with CAS and (b) if speech inconsistency is a sensitive and specific diagnostic marker that can differentiate between CAS and…
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DEFF Research Database (Denmark)
Niebuhr, Oliver
2017-01-01
of reduction levels and perceived speaker attributes in which moderate reduction can make a better impression on listeners than no reduction. In addition to its relevance in reduction models and theories, this interplay is instructive for various fields of speech application from social robotics to charisma...... whether variation in the degree of reduction also has a systematic effect on the attributes we ascribe to the speaker who produces the speech signal. A perception experiment was carried out for German in which 46 listeners judged whether or not speakers showing 3 different combinations of segmental...... and prosodic reduction levels (unreduced, moderately reduced, strongly reduced) are appropriately described by 13 physical, social, and cognitive attributes. The experiment shows that clear speech is not mere speech, and less clear speech is not just reduced either. Rather, results revealed a complex interplay...
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Predictive Brain Mechanisms in Sound-to-Meaning Mapping during Speech Processing.
Lyu, Bingjiang; Ge, Jianqiao; Niu, Zhendong; Tan, Li Hai; Gao, Jia-Hong
2016-10-19
Spoken language comprehension relies not only on the identification of individual words, but also on the expectations arising from contextual information. A distributed frontotemporal network is known to facilitate the mapping of speech sounds onto their corresponding meanings. However, how prior expectations influence this efficient mapping at the neuroanatomical level, especially in terms of individual words, remains unclear. Using fMRI, we addressed this question in the framework of the dual-stream model by scanning native speakers of Mandarin Chinese, a language highly dependent on context. We found that, within the ventral pathway, the violated expectations elicited stronger activations in the left anterior superior temporal gyrus and the ventral inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) for the phonological-semantic prediction of spoken words. Functional connectivity analysis showed that expectations were mediated by both top-down modulation from the left ventral IFG to the anterior temporal regions and enhanced cross-stream integration through strengthened connections between different subregions of the left IFG. By further investigating the dynamic causality within the dual-stream model, we elucidated how the human brain accomplishes sound-to-meaning mapping for words in a predictive manner. In daily communication via spoken language, one of the core processes is understanding the words being used. Effortless and efficient information exchange via speech relies not only on the identification of individual spoken words, but also on the contextual information giving rise to expected meanings. Despite the accumulating evidence for the bottom-up perception of auditory input, it is still not fully understood how the top-down modulation is achieved in the extensive frontotemporal cortical network. Here, we provide a comprehensive description of the neural substrates underlying sound-to-meaning mapping and demonstrate how the dual-stream model functions in the modulation of
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Audiovisual Temporal Recalibration for Speech in Synchrony Perception and Speech Identification
Asakawa, Kaori; Tanaka, Akihiro; Imai, Hisato
We investigated whether audiovisual synchrony perception for speech could change after observation of the audiovisual temporal mismatch. Previous studies have revealed that audiovisual synchrony perception is re-calibrated after exposure to a constant timing difference between auditory and visual signals in non-speech. In the present study, we examined whether this audiovisual temporal recalibration occurs at the perceptual level even for speech (monosyllables). In Experiment 1, participants performed an audiovisual simultaneity judgment task (i.e., a direct measurement of the audiovisual synchrony perception) in terms of the speech signal after observation of the speech stimuli which had a constant audiovisual lag. The results showed that the “simultaneous” responses (i.e., proportion of responses for which participants judged the auditory and visual stimuli to be synchronous) at least partly depended on exposure lag. In Experiment 2, we adopted the McGurk identification task (i.e., an indirect measurement of the audiovisual synchrony perception) to exclude the possibility that this modulation of synchrony perception was solely attributable to the response strategy using stimuli identical to those of Experiment 1. The characteristics of the McGurk effect reported by participants depended on exposure lag. Thus, it was shown that audiovisual synchrony perception for speech could be modulated following exposure to constant lag both in direct and indirect measurement. Our results suggest that temporal recalibration occurs not only in non-speech signals but also in monosyllabic speech at the perceptual level.
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Luo, X N; Yang, M; Liang, X F; Jin, K; Lv, L Y; Tian, C X; Yuan, Y C; Sun, J
2015-09-25
In this study, 12 polymorphic microsatellites were inves-tigated to determine the genetic diversity and structure of 5 consecu-tive selected populations of golden mandarin fish (Siniperca scherzeri Steindachner). The total numbers of alleles, average heterozyosity, and average polymorphism information content showed that the genetic diversity of these breeding populations was decreasing. Additionally, pairwise fixation index FST values among populations and Da values in-creased from F1 generation to subsequent generations (FST values from 0.0221-0.1408; Da values from 0.0608-0.1951). Analysis of molecular variance indicated that most genetic variations arise from individuals within populations (about 92.05%), while variation among populations accounted for only 7.95%. The allele frequency of the loci SC75-220 and SC101-222 bp changed regularly in the 5 breeding generations. Their frequencies were gradually increased and showed an enrichment trend, indicating that there may be genetic correlations between these 2 loci and breeding traits. Our study indicated that microsatellite markers are effective for assessing the genetic variability in the golden mandarin fish breeding program.
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Under-resourced speech recognition based on the speech manifold
CSIR Research Space (South Africa)
Sahraeian, R
2015-09-01
Full Text Available Conventional acoustic modeling involves estimating many parameters to effectively model feature distributions. The sparseness of speech and text data, however, degrades the reliability of the estimation process and makes speech recognition a...
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PRACTICING SPEECH THERAPY INTERVENTION FOR SOCIAL INTEGRATION OF CHILDREN WITH SPEECH DISORDERS
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Martin Ofelia POPESCU
2016-11-01
Full Text Available The article presents a concise speech correction intervention program in of dyslalia in conjunction with capacity development of intra, interpersonal and social integration of children with speech disorders. The program main objectives represent: the potential increasing of individual social integration by correcting speech disorders in conjunction with intra- and interpersonal capacity, the potential growth of children and community groups for social integration by optimizing the socio-relational context of children with speech disorder. In the program were included 60 children / students with dyslalia speech disorders (monomorphic and polymorphic dyslalia, from 11 educational institutions - 6 kindergartens and 5 schools / secondary schools, joined with inter-school logopedic centre (CLI from Targu Jiu city and areas of Gorj district. The program was implemented under the assumption that therapeutic-formative intervention to correct speech disorders and facilitate the social integration will lead, in combination with correct pronunciation disorders, to social integration optimization of children with speech disorders. The results conirm the hypothesis and gives facts about the intervention program eficiency.
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Improving English Pronunciation: An Automated Instructional Approach
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Sugata Mitra
2003-01-01
Full Text Available This paper describes an experiment in which groups of children attempted to improve their English pronunciation using an English-language learning software, some English films, and a speech-to-text software engine. The experiment was designed to examine two hypotheses. The first is that speech-to-text software, trained in an appropriate voice, can act as an evaluator of accent and clarity of speech as well as help learners acquire a standard way of speaking. The second is that groups of children can operate a computer and improve their pronunciation and clarity of speech, on their own, with no intervention from teachers. The results of the experiment are positive and point to a possible new pedagogy.
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Zheng, Yingjun; Wu, Chao; Li, Juanhua; Li, Ruikeng; Peng, Hongjun; She, Shenglin; Ning, Yuping; Li, Liang
2018-04-04
Speech recognition under noisy "cocktail-party" environments involves multiple perceptual/cognitive processes, including target detection, selective attention, irrelevant signal inhibition, sensory/working memory, and speech production. Compared to health listeners, people with schizophrenia are more vulnerable to masking stimuli and perform worse in speech recognition under speech-on-speech masking conditions. Although the schizophrenia-related speech-recognition impairment under "cocktail-party" conditions is associated with deficits of various perceptual/cognitive processes, it is crucial to know whether the brain substrates critically underlying speech detection against informational speech masking are impaired in people with schizophrenia. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), this study investigated differences between people with schizophrenia (n = 19, mean age = 33 ± 10 years) and their matched healthy controls (n = 15, mean age = 30 ± 9 years) in intra-network functional connectivity (FC) specifically associated with target-speech detection under speech-on-speech-masking conditions. The target-speech detection performance under the speech-on-speech-masking condition in participants with schizophrenia was significantly worse than that in matched healthy participants (healthy controls). Moreover, in healthy controls, but not participants with schizophrenia, the strength of intra-network FC within the bilateral caudate was positively correlated with the speech-detection performance under the speech-masking conditions. Compared to controls, patients showed altered spatial activity pattern and decreased intra-network FC in the caudate. In people with schizophrenia, the declined speech-detection performance under speech-on-speech masking conditions is associated with reduced intra-caudate functional connectivity, which normally contributes to detecting target speech against speech masking via its functions of suppressing masking-speech signals.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Miladis Fornaris-Méndez
2017-04-01
Full Text Available Language therapy has trafficked from a medical focus until a preventive focus. However, difficulties are evidenced in the development of this last task, because he is devoted bigger space to the correction of the disorders of the language. Because the speech disorders is the dysfunction with more frequently appearance, acquires special importance the preventive work that is developed to avoid its appearance. Speech education since early age of the childhood makes work easier for prevent the appearance of speech disorders in the children. The present work has as objective to offer different activities for the prevention of the speech disorders.
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Speech and Speech-Related Quality of Life After Late Palate Repair: A Patient's Perspective.
Schönmeyr, Björn; Wendby, Lisa; Sharma, Mitali; Jacobson, Lia; Restrepo, Carolina; Campbell, Alex
2015-07-01
Many patients with cleft palate deformities worldwide receive treatment at a later age than is recommended for normal speech to develop. The outcomes after late palate repairs in terms of speech and quality of life (QOL) still remain largely unstudied. In the current study, questionnaires were used to assess the patients' perception of speech and QOL before and after primary palate repair. All of the patients were operated at a cleft center in northeast India and had a cleft palate with a normal lip or with a cleft lip that had been previously repaired. A total of 134 patients (7-35 years) were interviewed preoperatively and 46 patients (7-32 years) were assessed in the postoperative survey. The survey showed that scores based on the speech handicap index, concerning speech and speech-related QOL, did not improve postoperatively. In fact, the questionnaires indicated that the speech became more unpredictable (P reported that their self-confidence had improved after the operation. Thus, the majority of interviewed patients who underwent late primary palate repair were satisfied with the surgery. At the same time, speech and speech-related QOL did not improve according to the speech handicap index-based survey. Speech predictability may even become worse and nasal regurgitation may increase after late palate repair, according to these results.
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Jerger, Susan; Damian, Markus F.; McAlpine, Rachel P.; Abdi, Herve
2018-01-01
To communicate, children must discriminate and identify speech sounds. Because visual speech plays an important role in this process, we explored how visual speech influences phoneme discrimination and identification by children. Critical items had intact visual speech (e.g. baez) coupled to non-intact (excised onsets) auditory speech (signified…
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Tackling the complexity in speech
DEFF Research Database (Denmark)
section includes four carefully selected chapters. They deal with facets of speech production, speech acoustics, and/or speech perception or recognition, place them in an integrated phonetic-phonological perspective, and relate them in more or less explicit ways to aspects of speech technology. Therefore......, we hope that this volume can help speech scientists with traditional training in phonetics and phonology to keep up with the latest developments in speech technology. In the opposite direction, speech researchers starting from a technological perspective will hopefully get inspired by reading about...... the questions, phenomena, and communicative functions that are currently addressed in phonetics and phonology. Either way, the future of speech research lies in international, interdisciplinary collaborations, and our volume is meant to reflect and facilitate such collaborations...
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Project accent: graphite irradiated creep in a materials test reactor
International Nuclear Information System (INIS)
Brooking, M.
2014-01-01
Atkins manages a pioneering programme of irradiation experiments for EDF Energy. One of these projects is Project ACCENT, designed to obtain evidence of a beneficial physical property of the graphite, which may extend the life of the Advanced Gas-cooled Reactors (AGRs). The project team combines the in-house experience of EDF Energy with two supplier organisations (providing the material test reactors and testing facilities) and supporting consultancies (Atkins and an independent technical expert). This paper describes: - Brief summary of the Project; - Discussion of the challenges faced by the Project; and - Conclusion elaborating on the aims of the Project. These challenging experiments use bespoke technology and both un-irradiated (virgin) and irradiated AGR graphite. The results will help to better understand graphite irradiation-induced creep (or stress modified dimensional change) properties and therefore more accurately determine lifetime and safe operating envelopes of the AGRs. The first round of irradiation has been completed, with a second round about to commence. This is a key step to realising the full lifetime ambition for AGRs, demonstrating the relaxation of stresses within the graphite bricks. (authors)
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Writing in Nonstandard English. Pragmatics & Beyond New Series 67.
Taavitsainen, Irma, Ed.; Melchers, Gunnel, Ed.; Pahta, Paivi, Ed.
Chapters in this book include the following: "Dickens as Sociolinguist: Dialect in 'David Copperfield'" (Patricia Poussa); "Contemporary Irish Writing and a Model of Speech Realism (John M. Kirk); "Dialect and Accent in Jim Cartwright's Play "Road" as Seen Through Erving Goffman's Theory on Footing" (Marion Fields); "The Representation of…
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Speech in spinocerebellar ataxia.
Schalling, Ellika; Hartelius, Lena
2013-12-01
Spinocerebellar ataxias (SCAs) are a heterogeneous group of autosomal dominant cerebellar ataxias clinically characterized by progressive ataxia, dysarthria and a range of other concomitant neurological symptoms. Only a few studies include detailed characterization of speech symptoms in SCA. Speech symptoms in SCA resemble ataxic dysarthria but symptoms related to phonation may be more prominent. One study to date has shown an association between differences in speech and voice symptoms related to genotype. More studies of speech and voice phenotypes are motivated, to possibly aid in clinical diagnosis. In addition, instrumental speech analysis has been demonstrated to be a reliable measure that may be used to monitor disease progression or therapy outcomes in possible future pharmacological treatments. Intervention by speech and language pathologists should go beyond assessment. Clinical guidelines for management of speech, communication and swallowing need to be developed for individuals with progressive cerebellar ataxia. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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Huang, Xianjun; Yang, Jin-Chen
2016-01-20
The present study investigated the effect of lexical competition on the time course of spoken word recognition in Mandarin Chinese using a unimodal auditory priming paradigm. Two kinds of competitive environments were designed. In one session (session 1), only the unrelated and the identical primes were presented before the target words. In the other session (session 2), besides the two conditions in session 1, the target words were also preceded by the cohort primes that have the same initial syllables as the targets. Behavioral results showed an inhibitory effect of the cohort competitors (primes) on target word recognition. The event-related potential results showed that the spoken word recognition processing in the middle and late latency windows is modulated by whether the phonologically related competitors are presented or not. Specifically, preceding activation of the competitors can induce direct competitions between multiple candidate words and lead to increased processing difficulties, primarily at the word disambiguation and selection stage during Mandarin Chinese spoken word recognition. The current study provided both behavioral and electrophysiological evidences for the lexical competition effect among the candidate words during spoken word recognition.
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Lee, Jimin; Hustad, Katherine C.; Weismer, Gary
2014-01-01
Purpose: Speech acoustic characteristics of children with cerebral palsy (CP) were examined with a multiple speech subsystems approach; speech intelligibility was evaluated using a prediction model in which acoustic measures were selected to represent three speech subsystems. Method: Nine acoustic variables reflecting different subsystems, and…
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Stasenko, Alena; Bonn, Cory; Teghipco, Alex; Garcea, Frank E; Sweet, Catherine; Dombovy, Mary; McDonough, Joyce; Mahon, Bradford Z
2015-01-01
The debate about the causal role of the motor system in speech perception has been reignited by demonstrations that motor processes are engaged during the processing of speech sounds. Here, we evaluate which aspects of auditory speech processing are affected, and which are not, in a stroke patient with dysfunction of the speech motor system. We found that the patient showed a normal phonemic categorical boundary when discriminating two non-words that differ by a minimal pair (e.g., ADA-AGA). However, using the same stimuli, the patient was unable to identify or label the non-word stimuli (using a button-press response). A control task showed that he could identify speech sounds by speaker gender, ruling out a general labelling impairment. These data suggest that while the motor system is not causally involved in perception of the speech signal, it may be used when other cues (e.g., meaning, context) are not available.
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The Relationship between Speech Production and Speech Perception Deficits in Parkinson's Disease
De Keyser, Kim; Santens, Patrick; Bockstael, Annelies; Botteldooren, Dick; Talsma, Durk; De Vos, Stefanie; Van Cauwenberghe, Mieke; Verheugen, Femke; Corthals, Paul; De Letter, Miet
2016-01-01
Purpose: This study investigated the possible relationship between hypokinetic speech production and speech intensity perception in patients with Parkinson's disease (PD). Method: Participants included 14 patients with idiopathic PD and 14 matched healthy controls (HCs) with normal hearing and cognition. First, speech production was objectified…
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Visual speech information: a help or hindrance in perceptual processing of dysarthric speech.
Borrie, Stephanie A
2015-03-01
This study investigated the influence of visual speech information on perceptual processing of neurologically degraded speech. Fifty listeners identified spastic dysarthric speech under both audio (A) and audiovisual (AV) conditions. Condition comparisons revealed that the addition of visual speech information enhanced processing of the neurologically degraded input in terms of (a) acuity (percent phonemes correct) of vowels and consonants and (b) recognition (percent words correct) of predictive and nonpredictive phrases. Listeners exploited stress-based segmentation strategies more readily in AV conditions, suggesting that the perceptual benefit associated with adding visual speech information to the auditory signal-the AV advantage-has both segmental and suprasegmental origins. Results also revealed that the magnitude of the AV advantage can be predicted, to some degree, by the extent to which an individual utilizes syllabic stress cues to inform word recognition in AV conditions. Findings inform the development of a listener-specific model of speech perception that applies to processing of dysarthric speech in everyday communication contexts.
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The treatment of apraxia of speech : Speech and music therapy, an innovative joint effort
Hurkmans, Josephus Johannes Stephanus
2016-01-01
Apraxia of Speech (AoS) is a neurogenic speech disorder. A wide variety of behavioural methods have been developed to treat AoS. Various therapy programmes use musical elements to improve speech production. A unique therapy programme combining elements of speech therapy and music therapy is called
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Practical speech user interface design
Lewis, James R
2010-01-01
Although speech is the most natural form of communication between humans, most people find using speech to communicate with machines anything but natural. Drawing from psychology, human-computer interaction, linguistics, and communication theory, Practical Speech User Interface Design provides a comprehensive yet concise survey of practical speech user interface (SUI) design. It offers practice-based and research-based guidance on how to design effective, efficient, and pleasant speech applications that people can really use. Focusing on the design of speech user interfaces for IVR application
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International Nuclear Information System (INIS)
Palou, L.; Río, M. A. del; Marcilla, A.; Alonso, M.; Jacas, J. A.
2007-01-01
In the present work, survival of the Mediterranean fruit fly Ceratitis capitata (Wiedemann) (Diptera: Tephritidae) on artificially infested 'Clemenules' clementine mandarins (Citrus reticulata Blanco) was assessed on fruit subjected to integrated quarantine treatments consisting of irradiation with X-rays at doses of 0 (control), 30, 54, and 164 Gy followed by exposure to 1 deg C for 0 (control), 3, 6, 9, or 12 days. Additionally, physico-chemical (rind color, firmness, and physiological disorders, soluble solids concentration, titratable acidity, maturity index, juice yield, and ethanol and acetaldehyde content) and sensory (sweetness, acidity, sensory maturity index, off-flavors, and mandarin-like flavor) fruit quality of 'Clemenules' clementines were assessed on X-irradiated fruit exposed to 1 deg C for 0 (control), 6, or 12 days. Complete insect mortality with no negative effects on fruit quality after 7 days at 20 deg C of shelf life was obtained on clementines firstly X-irradiated at 30 Gy and subsequently exposed to 1 deg C for 2 days. This combination of treatments considerably reduced quarantine time if compared to standard cold quarantine treatments (1.1-2.2 deg C for 14-18 days) and therefore showed promise as a potential commercial treatment for Spanish citrus exports [es
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Poole, Matthew L.; Brodtmann, Amy; Darby, David; Vogel, Adam P.
2017-01-01
Purpose: Our purpose was to create a comprehensive review of speech impairment in frontotemporal dementia (FTD), primary progressive aphasia (PPA), and progressive apraxia of speech in order to identify the most effective measures for diagnosis and monitoring, and to elucidate associations between speech and neuroimaging. Method: Speech and…
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A Comparison of English and Mandarin-Speaking Preschool Children’s Imitation of Motion Events
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Zhidan Wang
2017-06-01
Full Text Available Typically in English, a “satellite-framed” language, manner is expressed in the verb and path is expressed in supporting words. Past studies using looking time techniques suggest that English-speaking 3-year-olds show language-specific action processing, but 2.5-year-olds preferentially attend to path regardless of native language. In Study 1, we test whether language-specific action component preferences will be reflected in children’s imitation, as a more explicit measure. Children who spoke English saw an adult move an object along a series of platforms using one of two paths and manners. Then, the children were given the opportunity to move the object on a different test platform, which was designed to force them to choose to reproduce either the demonstrated path or the manner. The results showed that 3-year-olds, but not 2.5-year-olds, were more likely to imitate the manner versus the path. In Study 2, we extend the investigation to a less commonly studied language within this domain, Mandarin. Typically in Mandarin, an “equipollently framed” language, both manner and path are expressed within equally significant verbs. The results indicated that 3-year-olds did not show a consistent preference to imitate either the path or the manner. In contrast, 2.5-year-olds were more likely to imitate the path than the manner. This research highlights the potential for the imitation choice paradigm, as an explicit measure, to understand how language affects cognition, and suggests a new language-specific pattern in action interpretation.
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Effects of gender and regional dialect on prosodic patterns in American English
Clopper, Cynthia G.; Smiljanic, Rajka
2011-01-01
While cross-dialect prosodic variation has been well established for many languages, most variationist research on regional dialects of American English has focused on the vowel system. The current study was designed to explore prosodic variation in read speech in two regional varieties of American English: Southern and Midland. Prosodic dialect variation was analyzed in two domains: speaking rate and the phonetic expression of pitch movements associated with accented and phrase-final syllables. The results revealed significant effects of regional dialect on the distributions of pauses, pitch accents, and phrasal-boundary tone combinations. Significant effects of talker gender were also observed on the distributions of pitch accents and phrasal-boundary tone combinations. The findings from this study demonstrate that regional and gender identity features are encoded in part through prosody, and provide further motivation for the close examination of prosodic patterns across regional and social varieties of American English. PMID:21686317
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An analysis of the masking of speech by competing speech using self-report data.
Agus, Trevor R; Akeroyd, Michael A; Noble, William; Bhullar, Navjot
2009-01-01
Many of the items in the "Speech, Spatial, and Qualities of Hearing" scale questionnaire [S. Gatehouse and W. Noble, Int. J. Audiol. 43, 85-99 (2004)] are concerned with speech understanding in a variety of backgrounds, both speech and nonspeech. To study if this self-report data reflected informational masking, previously collected data on 414 people were analyzed. The lowest scores (greatest difficulties) were found for the two items in which there were two speech targets, with successively higher scores for competing speech (six items), energetic masking (one item), and no masking (three items). The results suggest significant masking by competing speech in everyday listening situations.
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Oliveira, Tahise M; da Silva, Fernanda R; Bonatto, Diego; Neves, Diana M; Morillon, Raphael; Maserti, Bianca E; Filho, Mauricio A Coelho; Costa, Marcio G C; Pirovani, Carlos P; Gesteira, Abelmon S
2015-03-03
Rootstocks play a major role in the tolerance of citrus plants to water deficit by controlling and adjusting the water supply to meet the transpiration demand of the shoots. Alterations in protein abundance in citrus roots are crucial for plant adaptation to water deficit. We performed two-dimensional electrophoresis (2-DE) separation followed by LC/MS/MS to assess the proteome responses of the roots of two citrus rootstocks, Rangpur lime (Citrus limonia Osbeck) and 'Sunki Maravilha' (Citrus sunki) mandarin, which show contrasting tolerances to water deficits at the physiological and molecular levels. Changes in the abundance of 36 and 38 proteins in Rangpur lime and 'Sunki Maravilha' mandarin, respectively, were observed via LC/MS/MS in response to water deficit. Multivariate principal component analysis (PCA) of the data revealed major changes in the protein profile of 'Sunki Maravilha' in response to water deficit. Additionally, proteomics and systems biology analyses allowed for the general elucidation of the major mechanisms associated with the differential responses to water deficit of both varieties. The defense mechanisms of Rangpur lime included changes in the metabolism of carbohydrates and amino acids as well as in the activation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) detoxification and in the levels of proteins involved in water stress defense. In contrast, the adaptation of 'Sunki Maravilha' to stress was aided by the activation of DNA repair and processing proteins. Our study reveals that the levels of a number of proteins involved in various cellular pathways are affected during water deficit in the roots of citrus plants. The results show that acclimatization to water deficit involves specific responses in Rangpur lime and 'Sunki Maravilha' mandarin. This study provides insights into the effects of drought on the abundance of proteins in the roots of two varieties of citrus rootstocks. In addition, this work allows for a better understanding of the
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Extraction and characterization of mandarin essential oil obtained from agroindustrial residues
International Nuclear Information System (INIS)
Navarrete, Carolina; Gil, Jesus; Durango, Diego; Garcia, Carlos
2010-01-01
In recent years, citrus national agroindustries have shown a significant momentum, led by the market expansion of fruit derivatives. This activity has resulted in the generation of large amounts of waste, which could have a potential as starting material for the development of commercial products with high added value such as essential oils (EO), fixed oils, and fibres among others. The EO have a strong demand in the food industry, pharmaceuticals, and cosmetics. This paper describes the extraction and characterization of mandarin EO obtained through steam distillation, of agroindustrial waste. The effect of vapour pressure, thickness, and the number of layers of plant material, were evaluated on the yield and quality of EO. The operating conditions were adjusted in accordance to the design characteristics of the extraction plant of a local company.
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Kamiya, Toshiyuki; Numano, Nagisa; Yagyu, Hiroyuki; Shimazu, Hideo
This paper describes a mobile phone-based data logging system for monitoring the growing status of Satsuma mandarin, a type of citrus fruit, in the field. The system can provide various feedback to the farm producers with collected data, such as visualization of related data as a timeline chart or advice on the necessity of watering crops. It is important to collect information on environment conditions, plant status and product quality, to analyze it and to provide it as feedback to the farm producers to aid their operations. This paper proposes a novel framework of field monitoring and feedback for open-field farming. For field monitoring, it combines a low-cost plant status monitoring method using a simple apparatus and a Field Server for environment condition monitoring. Each field worker has a simple apparatus to measure fruit firmness and records data with a mobile phone. The logged data are stored in the database of the system on the server. The system analyzes stored data for each field and is able to show the necessity of watering to the user in five levels. The system is also able to show various stored data in timeline chart form. The user and coach can compare or analyze these data via a web interface. A test site was built at a Satsuma mandarin field at Kumano in Mie Prefecture, Japan using the framework, and farm workers monitor in the area used and evaluated the system.
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Neural pathways for visual speech perception
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Lynne E Bernstein
2014-12-01
Full Text Available This paper examines the questions, what levels of speech can be perceived visually, and how is visual speech represented by the brain? Review of the literature leads to the conclusions that every level of psycholinguistic speech structure (i.e., phonetic features, phonemes, syllables, words, and prosody can be perceived visually, although individuals differ in their abilities to do so; and that there are visual modality-specific representations of speech qua speech in higher-level vision brain areas. That is, the visual system represents the modal patterns of visual speech. The suggestion that the auditory speech pathway receives and represents visual speech is examined in light of neuroimaging evidence on the auditory speech pathways. We outline the generally agreed-upon organization of the visual ventral and dorsal pathways and examine several types of visual processing that might be related to speech through those pathways, specifically, face and body, orthography, and sign language processing. In this context, we examine the visual speech processing literature, which reveals widespread diverse patterns activity in posterior temporal cortices in response to visual speech stimuli. We outline a model of the visual and auditory speech pathways and make several suggestions: (1 The visual perception of speech relies on visual pathway representations of speech qua speech. (2 A proposed site of these representations, the temporal visual speech area (TVSA has been demonstrated in posterior temporal cortex, ventral and posterior to multisensory posterior superior temporal sulcus (pSTS. (3 Given that visual speech has dynamic and configural features, its representations in feedforward visual pathways are expected to integrate these features, possibly in TVSA.
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Ladegaard, Hans J.; Sachdev, Itesh
2006-01-01
The power and status of America in the world today are undeniable. This paper presents some empirical data about the attitudes and perceptions Danish learners of EFL have about British and American English. Ninety-six EFL learners participated in a verbal-guise experiment that involved rating different accents of English: American, Australian,…
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Molina-Naar, José
2016-01-01
The sociopolitical, sociocultural, and sociolinguistic issues many Latino immigrants face as they embark on the process of adjusting to American society have been depicted by many Hispanic American writers in the United States. Julia Álvarez's "How the García Girls Lost Their Accents" attempts to raise awareness of these issues through…
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Language Attitudes in Guangzhou, China.
Kalmar, Ivan; And Others
1987-01-01
Presents comparison of Cantonese and non-Cantonese students' expressed judgments of two samples of speech produced by same person but presented as coming from two different speakers. Although all students thought the better speaker would have a better chance for social advancement, Cantonese subjects who spoke with heavy Cantonese accents were…
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I Find You Attractive but I Don't Trust You: The Case of Language Attitudes in Iran
Mirshahidi, Shahriar
2017-01-01
Although Article 15 of the Iranian constitution endorses non-Persian Languages, speakers of these minority languages are latently obligated to speak Persian, the majority language, in most social settings. Consequently, these Iranian L2 speakers of Persian give rise to certain attitudes towards their accented speech, particularly from speakers of…
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Part-of-speech effects on text-to-speech synthesis
CSIR Research Space (South Africa)
Schlunz, GI
2010-11-01
Full Text Available One of the goals of text-to-speech (TTS) systems is to produce natural-sounding synthesised speech. Towards this end various natural language processing (NLP) tasks are performed to model the prosodic aspects of the TTS voice. One of the fundamental...
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2010-05-12
...] Telecommunications Relay Services and Speech-to-Speech Services for Individuals With Hearing and Speech Disabilities... proposed compensation rates for Interstate TRS, Speech-to-Speech Services (STS), Captioned Telephone... costs reported in the data submitted to NECA by VRS providers. In this regard, document DA 10-761 also...
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Gallardo, L.F.; Möller, S.; Beerends, J.
2017-01-01
The performance of automatic speech recognition based on coded-decoded speech heavily depends on the quality of the transmitted signals, determined by channel impairments. This paper examines relationships between speech recognition performance and measurements of speech quality and intelligibility
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[Non-speech oral motor treatment efficacy for children with developmental speech sound disorders].
Ygual-Fernandez, A; Cervera-Merida, J F
2016-01-01
In the treatment of speech disorders by means of speech therapy two antagonistic methodological approaches are applied: non-verbal ones, based on oral motor exercises (OME), and verbal ones, which are based on speech processing tasks with syllables, phonemes and words. In Spain, OME programmes are called 'programas de praxias', and are widely used and valued by speech therapists. To review the studies conducted on the effectiveness of OME-based treatments applied to children with speech disorders and the theoretical arguments that could justify, or not, their usefulness. Over the last few decades evidence has been gathered about the lack of efficacy of this approach to treat developmental speech disorders and pronunciation problems in populations without any neurological alteration of motor functioning. The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association has advised against its use taking into account the principles of evidence-based practice. The knowledge gathered to date on motor control shows that the pattern of mobility and its corresponding organisation in the brain are different in speech and other non-verbal functions linked to nutrition and breathing. Neither the studies on their effectiveness nor the arguments based on motor control studies recommend the use of OME-based programmes for the treatment of pronunciation problems in children with developmental language disorders.
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Brown-Schmidt, Sarah; Canseco-Gonzalez, Enriqueta
2004-01-01
In Mandarin Chinese, word meaning is partially determined by lexical tone (Wang, 1973). Previous studies suggest that lexical tone is processed as linguistic information and not as pure tonal information (Gandour, 1998; Van Lanker & Fromkin, 1973). The current study explored the online processing of lexical tones. Event-related potentials were…
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Sanja Radonjić
2013-01-01
Full Text Available The Mediterranean fruit fly Ceratitis capitata Widem. has been an established pest onthe Montenegrin seacoast for more than ten years, although with variable abundance indifferent years and localities.From an economic aspect, its most important host in Montenegro is the mandarinunshiu (Citrus unshiu Marc., particularly its cultivar Owari. Dispersion of C. capitata in citrusorchards (prevailingly mandarin was monitored on Baošići, Lastva Grbaljska and Bar localitiesduring 2003 and 2004.The results of this study showed that, during both years, peripheral-row trees (primarily thefirst row in citrus orchards were more exposed to attacks by C. capitata than middle and lastrows. In 2003, the average number of larvae in mandarin fruits in first rows varied from 11.4±0.59to 40.1±0.67, from 7.04±0.47 to 28.8±0.48 and from 2.9±0.07 to 17.3±0.54 on the localities ofBaošići, Lastva Grbaljska and Bar, respectively. On the same localities, it ranged from 7.4±0.34 to16.9±0.4, from 0.0 to 18.7±0.32 and from 0.0 to 9.93±0.56 in middle rows, and from 3.0±0.28 to16.8±0.77, from 0.0 to 20.9±0.38 and from 0.0 to 13.1±0.39 in last rows. Data collected at Baošići,Lastva Grbaljska and Bar in 2003 also suggest that the average number of larvae per mandarinfruit in first rows was 1.78-2.08 times higher than in middle rows, and 1.25-1.77 times higher thanin last rows. In 2004, the average number of larvae in mandarin fruits in first rows varied from7.3±0.27 to 8.3±0.45, from 7.2±0.23 to 17.6±0.59 and from 3.8±0.1 to 8.8±0.25 on the localitiesof Baošići, Lastva Grbaljska and Bar, respectively. On these localities, it ranged from 1.7 ±0.17 to3.3±0.19, from 1.1±0.12 to 3.5±0.8 and from 0.0 to 0.8±0.14 in middle rows, and from 1.7±0.17 to3.6±0.32, from 0.0 to 4.0±0.26 and from 0.0 to 0.2±0.06 in last rows. Data collected in 2004also showed that the average number of larvae in mandarin fruits in first rows on the samelocalities was 3
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2010-09-03
...] Telecommunications Relay Services and Speech-to-Speech Services for Individuals With Hearing and Speech Disabilities...; speech-to-speech (STS); pay-per-call (900) calls; types of calls; and equal access to interexchange... of a report, due April 16, 2011, addressing whether it is necessary for the waivers to remain in...
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Speech Acquisition and Automatic Speech Recognition for Integrated Spacesuit Audio Systems
Huang, Yiteng; Chen, Jingdong; Chen, Shaoyan
2010-01-01
A voice-command human-machine interface system has been developed for spacesuit extravehicular activity (EVA) missions. A multichannel acoustic signal processing method has been created for distant speech acquisition in noisy and reverberant environments. This technology reduces noise by exploiting differences in the statistical nature of signal (i.e., speech) and noise that exists in the spatial and temporal domains. As a result, the automatic speech recognition (ASR) accuracy can be improved to the level at which crewmembers would find the speech interface useful. The developed speech human/machine interface will enable both crewmember usability and operational efficiency. It can enjoy a fast rate of data/text entry, small overall size, and can be lightweight. In addition, this design will free the hands and eyes of a suited crewmember. The system components and steps include beam forming/multi-channel noise reduction, single-channel noise reduction, speech feature extraction, feature transformation and normalization, feature compression, model adaption, ASR HMM (Hidden Markov Model) training, and ASR decoding. A state-of-the-art phoneme recognizer can obtain an accuracy rate of 65 percent when the training and testing data are free of noise. When it is used in spacesuits, the rate drops to about 33 percent. With the developed microphone array speech-processing technologies, the performance is improved and the phoneme recognition accuracy rate rises to 44 percent. The recognizer can be further improved by combining the microphone array and HMM model adaptation techniques and using speech samples collected from inside spacesuits. In addition, arithmetic complexity models for the major HMMbased ASR components were developed. They can help real-time ASR system designers select proper tasks when in the face of constraints in computational resources.
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Environmental Contamination of Normal Speech.
Harley, Trevor A.
1990-01-01
Environmentally contaminated speech errors (irrelevant words or phrases derived from the speaker's environment and erroneously incorporated into speech) are hypothesized to occur at a high level of speech processing, but with a relatively late insertion point. The data indicate that speech production processes are not independent of other…
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Lu, Lingxi; Bao, Xiaohan; Chen, Jing; Qu, Tianshu; Wu, Xihong; Li, Liang
2018-05-01
Under a noisy "cocktail-party" listening condition with multiple people talking, listeners can use various perceptual/cognitive unmasking cues to improve recognition of the target speech against informational speech-on-speech masking. One potential unmasking cue is the emotion expressed in a speech voice, by means of certain acoustical features. However, it was unclear whether emotionally conditioning a target-speech voice that has none of the typical acoustical features of emotions (i.e., an emotionally neutral voice) can be used by listeners for enhancing target-speech recognition under speech-on-speech masking conditions. In this study we examined the recognition of target speech against a two-talker speech masker both before and after the emotionally neutral target voice was paired with a loud female screaming sound that has a marked negative emotional valence. The results showed that recognition of the target speech (especially the first keyword in a target sentence) was significantly improved by emotionally conditioning the target speaker's voice. Moreover, the emotional unmasking effect was independent of the unmasking effect of the perceived spatial separation between the target speech and the masker. Also, (skin conductance) electrodermal responses became stronger after emotional learning when the target speech and masker were perceptually co-located, suggesting an increase of listening efforts when the target speech was informationally masked. These results indicate that emotionally conditioning the target speaker's voice does not change the acoustical parameters of the target-speech stimuli, but the emotionally conditioned vocal features can be used as cues for unmasking target speech.
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Single cell protein production from mandarin orange peel
Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)
Nishio, N.; Nagai, S.
1981-01-01
As the hydrolysis of mandarin orange peel with macerating enzyme (40/sup 0/C,24 h)produced 0.59 g g/sup -1/ reducing sugar per dry peel compared to 0.36 by acid-hydrolysis (15 min at 120/sup 0/C with 0.8 N H/sub 2/SO/sub 4/), the production of single cell protein (SCP) from orange peel was studied mostly using enzymatically hydrolyzed orange peel. When the enzymatically hydrolyzed peel media were used, the utilization efficiency of reducing sugars (%) and the growth yield from reducing sugars (gg/sup -1/)were: 63 and 0.51 for Saccharomyces cerevisiae; 56 and 0.48 for Candida utilis; 74 and 0.69 for Debaryomyces hansenii and 64 and 0.70 for Rhodotorula glutinis. SCP production from orange peel by D. hansenii and R. glutinis were further studied. Batch cultures for 24 h at 30/sup 0/C using 100 g dried orange peel produced 45 g of dried cultivated peel (protein content, 33%) with D. hansenii and 34 g (protein content, 50%) with R. glutinis, and 38 g (protein content, 44%) with a mixture of both yeasts.
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Multilevel Analysis in Analyzing Speech Data
Guddattu, Vasudeva; Krishna, Y.
2011-01-01
The speech produced by human vocal tract is a complex acoustic signal, with diverse applications in phonetics, speech synthesis, automatic speech recognition, speaker identification, communication aids, speech pathology, speech perception, machine translation, hearing research, rehabilitation and assessment of communication disorders and many…
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Groenewold, Rimke; Bastiaanse, Roelien; Nickels, Lyndsey; Huiskes, Mike
2014-01-01
Background: Previous studies have shown that in semi-spontaneous speech, individuals with Broca's and anomic aphasia produce relatively many direct speech constructions. It has been claimed that in "healthy" communication direct speech constructions contribute to the liveliness, and indirectly to the comprehensibility, of speech.…
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Speech Enhancement by MAP Spectral Amplitude Estimation Using a Super-Gaussian Speech Model
Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Lotter Thomas
2005-01-01
Full Text Available This contribution presents two spectral amplitude estimators for acoustical background noise suppression based on maximum a posteriori estimation and super-Gaussian statistical modelling of the speech DFT amplitudes. The probability density function of the speech spectral amplitude is modelled with a simple parametric function, which allows a high approximation accuracy for Laplace- or Gamma-distributed real and imaginary parts of the speech DFT coefficients. Also, the statistical model can be adapted to optimally fit the distribution of the speech spectral amplitudes for a specific noise reduction system. Based on the super-Gaussian statistical model, computationally efficient maximum a posteriori speech estimators are derived, which outperform the commonly applied Ephraim-Malah algorithm.
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Vincent Aubanel
2016-08-01
Full Text Available A growing body of evidence shows that brain oscillations track speech. This mechanism is thought to maximise processing efficiency by allocating resources to important speech information, effectively parsing speech into units of appropriate granularity for further decoding. However, some aspects of this mechanism remain unclear. First, while periodicity is an intrinsic property of this physiological mechanism, speech is only quasi-periodic, so it is not clear whether periodicity would present an advantage in processing. Second, it is still a matter of debate which aspect of speech triggers or maintains cortical entrainment, from bottom-up cues such as fluctuations of the amplitude envelope of speech to higher level linguistic cues such as syntactic structure. We present data from a behavioural experiment assessing the effect of isochronous retiming of speech on speech perception in noise. Two types of anchor points were defined for retiming speech, namely syllable onsets and amplitude envelope peaks. For each anchor point type, retiming was implemented at two hierarchical levels, a slow time scale around 2.5 Hz and a fast time scale around 4 Hz. Results show that while any temporal distortion resulted in reduced speech intelligibility, isochronous speech anchored to P-centers (approximated by stressed syllable vowel onsets was significantly more intelligible than a matched anisochronous retiming, suggesting a facilitative role of periodicity defined on linguistically motivated units in processing speech in noise.
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DEFF Research Database (Denmark)
Poulsen, Torben
2000-01-01
An introduction is given to the the anatomy and the function of the ear, basic psychoacoustic matters (hearing threshold, loudness, masking), the speech signal and speech intelligibility. The lecture note is written for the course: Fundamentals of Acoustics and Noise Control (51001)......An introduction is given to the the anatomy and the function of the ear, basic psychoacoustic matters (hearing threshold, loudness, masking), the speech signal and speech intelligibility. The lecture note is written for the course: Fundamentals of Acoustics and Noise Control (51001)...
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Why Not Non-Native Varieties of English as Listening Comprehension Test Input?
Abeywickrama, Priyanvada
2013-01-01
The existence of different varieties of English in target language use (TLU) domains calls into question the usefulness of listening comprehension tests whose input is limited only to a native speaker variety. This study investigated the impact of non-native varieties or accented English speech on test takers from three different English use…
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The Cerebellum Generates Motor-to-Auditory Predictions: ERP Lesion Evidence
Knolle, Franziska; Schroger, Erich; Baess, Pamela; Kotz, Sonja A.
2012-01-01
Forward predictions are crucial in motor action (e.g., catching a ball, or being tickled) but may also apply to sensory or cognitive processes (e.g., listening to distorted speech or to a foreign accent). According to the "internal forward model," the cerebellum generates predictions about somatosensory consequences of movements. These predictions…
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Hwee Ling eLee
2014-08-01
Full Text Available This psychophysics study used musicians as a model to investigate whether musical expertise shapes the temporal integration window for audiovisual speech, sinewave speech or music. Musicians and non-musicians judged the audiovisual synchrony of speech, sinewave analogues of speech, and music stimuli at 13 audiovisual stimulus onset asynchronies (±360, ±300 ±240, ±180, ±120, ±60, and 0 ms. Further, we manipulated the duration of the stimuli by presenting sentences/melodies or syllables/tones. Critically, musicians relative to non-musicians exhibited significantly narrower temporal integration windows for both music and sinewave speech. Further, the temporal integration window for music decreased with the amount of music practice, but not with age of acquisition. In other words, the more musicians practiced piano in the past three years, the more sensitive they became to the temporal misalignment of visual and auditory signals. Collectively, our findings demonstrate that music practicing fine-tunes the audiovisual temporal integration window to various extents depending on the stimulus class. While the effect of piano practicing was most pronounced for music, it also generalized to other stimulus classes such as sinewave speech and to a marginally significant degree to natural speech.
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Chen, Yuchun; Liu, Huei-Mei
2014-01-01
Children with SLI exhibit overall deficits in novel word learning compared to their age-matched peers. However, the manifestation of the word learning difficulty in SLI was not consistent across tasks and the factors affecting the learning performance were not yet determined. Our aim is to examine the extent of word learning difficulties in Mandarin-speaking preschool children with SLI, and to explore the potent influence of existing lexical knowledge on to the word learning process. Preschool children with SLI (n=37) and typical language development (n=33) were exposed to novel words for unfamiliar objects embedded in stories. Word learning tasks including the initial mapping and short-term repetitive learning were designed. Results revealed that Mandarin-speaking preschool children with SLI performed as well as their age-peers in the initial form-meaning mapping task. Their word learning difficulty was only evidently shown in the short-term repetitive learning task under a production demand, and their learning speed was slower than the control group. Children with SLI learned the novel words with a semantic head better in both the initial mapping and repetitive learning tasks. Moderate correlations between stand word learning performances and scores on standardized vocabulary were found after controlling for children's age and nonverbal IQ. The results suggested that the word learning difficulty in children with SLI occurred in the process of establishing a robust phonological representation at the beginning stage of word learning. Also, implicit compound knowledge is applied to aid word learning process for children with and without SLI. We also provide the empirical data to validate the relationship between preschool children's word learning performance and their existing receptive vocabulary ability. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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Effect of gap detection threshold on consistency of speech in children with speech sound disorder.
Sayyahi, Fateme; Soleymani, Zahra; Akbari, Mohammad; Bijankhan, Mahmood; Dolatshahi, Behrooz
2017-02-01
The present study examined the relationship between gap detection threshold and speech error consistency in children with speech sound disorder. The participants were children five to six years of age who were categorized into three groups of typical speech, consistent speech disorder (CSD) and inconsistent speech disorder (ISD).The phonetic gap detection threshold test was used for this study, which is a valid test comprised six syllables with inter-stimulus intervals between 20-300ms. The participants were asked to listen to the recorded stimuli three times and indicate whether they heard one or two sounds. There was no significant difference between the typical and CSD groups (p=0.55), but there were significant differences in performance between the ISD and CSD groups and the ISD and typical groups (p=0.00). The ISD group discriminated between speech sounds at a higher threshold. Children with inconsistent speech errors could not distinguish speech sounds during time-limited phonetic discrimination. It is suggested that inconsistency in speech is a representation of inconsistency in auditory perception, which causes by high gap detection threshold. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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Speech Perception as a Multimodal Phenomenon
Rosenblum, Lawrence D.
2008-01-01
Speech perception is inherently multimodal. Visual speech (lip-reading) information is used by all perceivers and readily integrates with auditory speech. Imaging research suggests that the brain treats auditory and visual speech similarly. These findings have led some researchers to consider that speech perception works by extracting amodal information that takes the same form across modalities. From this perspective, speech integration is a property of the input information itself. Amodal s...
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Poor Speech Perception Is Not a Core Deficit of Childhood Apraxia of Speech: Preliminary Findings
Zuk, Jennifer; Iuzzini-Seigel, Jenya; Cabbage, Kathryn; Green, Jordan R.; Hogan, Tiffany P.
2018-01-01
Purpose: Childhood apraxia of speech (CAS) is hypothesized to arise from deficits in speech motor planning and programming, but the influence of abnormal speech perception in CAS on these processes is debated. This study examined speech perception abilities among children with CAS with and without language impairment compared to those with…
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Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)
Coletta Filho Helvécio Della
2000-01-01
Full Text Available RAPD analysis of 19 Ponkan mandarin accessions was performed using 25 random primers. Of 112 amplification products selected, only 32 were polymorphic across five accessions. The absence of genetic variability among the other 14 accessions suggested that they were either clonal propagations with different local names, or that they had undetectable genetic variability, such as point mutations which cannot be detected by RAPD.
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Dissociation of tone and vowel processing in Mandarin idioms.
Hu, Jiehui; Gao, Shan; Ma, Weiyi; Yao, Dezhong
2012-09-01
Using event-related potentials, this study measured the access of suprasegmental (tone) and segmental (vowel) information in spoken word recognition with Mandarin idioms. Participants performed a delayed-response acceptability task, in which they judged the correctness of the last word of each idiom, which might deviate from the correct word in either tone or vowel. Results showed that, compared with the correct idioms, a larger early negativity appeared only for vowel violation. Additionally, a larger N400 effect was observed for vowel mismatch than tone mismatch. A control experiment revealed that these differences were not due to low-level physical differences across conditions; instead, they represented the greater constraining power of vowels than tones in the lexical selection and semantic integration of the spoken words. Furthermore, tone violation elicited a more robust late positive component than vowel violation, suggesting different reanalyses of the two types of information. In summary, the current results support a functional dissociation of tone and vowel processing in spoken word recognition. Copyright © 2012 Society for Psychophysiological Research.
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Ogunfunmi, Tokunbo
2010-01-01
It is becoming increasingly apparent that all forms of communication-including voice-will be transmitted through packet-switched networks based on the Internet Protocol (IP). Therefore, the design of modern devices that rely on speech interfaces, such as cell phones and PDAs, requires a complete and up-to-date understanding of the basics of speech coding. Outlines key signal processing algorithms used to mitigate impairments to speech quality in VoIP networksOffering a detailed yet easily accessible introduction to the field, Principles of Speech Coding provides an in-depth examination of the
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Adank, Patti
2012-01-01
The role of speech production mechanisms in difficult speech comprehension is the subject of on-going debate in speech science. Two Activation Likelihood Estimation (ALE) analyses were conducted on neuroimaging studies investigating difficult speech comprehension or speech production. Meta-analysis 1 included 10 studies contrasting comprehension…
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The Development of L2 Fluency during Study Abroad: A Cross-Language Study
Di Silvio, Francesca; Diao, Wenhao; Donovan, Anne
2016-01-01
Examining speech samples from 75 American university students learning 1 of 3 languages (Mandarin, Russian, and Spanish), this article reports on a study of second language (L2) learners' oral fluency development and its relationship with their gains in holistic proficiency ratings during a semester abroad. In study abroad research, there is a…
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Metaheuristic applications to speech enhancement
Kunche, Prajna
2016-01-01
This book serves as a basic reference for those interested in the application of metaheuristics to speech enhancement. The major goal of the book is to explain the basic concepts of optimization methods and their use in heuristic optimization in speech enhancement to scientists, practicing engineers, and academic researchers in speech processing. The authors discuss why it has been a challenging problem for researchers to develop new enhancement algorithms that aid in the quality and intelligibility of degraded speech. They present powerful optimization methods to speech enhancement that can help to solve the noise reduction problems. Readers will be able to understand the fundamentals of speech processing as well as the optimization techniques, how the speech enhancement algorithms are implemented by utilizing optimization methods, and will be given the tools to develop new algorithms. The authors also provide a comprehensive literature survey regarding the topic.
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Davidow, Jason H.
2014-01-01
Background: Metronome-paced speech results in the elimination, or substantial reduction, of stuttering moments. The cause of fluency during this fluency-inducing condition is unknown. Several investigations have reported changes in speech pattern characteristics from a control condition to a metronome-paced speech condition, but failure to control…
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TongueToSpeech (TTS): Wearable wireless assistive device for augmented speech.
Marjanovic, Nicholas; Piccinini, Giacomo; Kerr, Kevin; Esmailbeigi, Hananeh
2017-07-01
Speech is an important aspect of human communication; individuals with speech impairment are unable to communicate vocally in real time. Our team has developed the TongueToSpeech (TTS) device with the goal of augmenting speech communication for the vocally impaired. The proposed device is a wearable wireless assistive device that incorporates a capacitive touch keyboard interface embedded inside a discrete retainer. This device connects to a computer, tablet or a smartphone via Bluetooth connection. The developed TTS application converts text typed by the tongue into audible speech. Our studies have concluded that an 8-contact point configuration between the tongue and the TTS device would yield the best user precision and speed performance. On average using the TTS device inside the oral cavity takes 2.5 times longer than the pointer finger using a T9 (Text on 9 keys) keyboard configuration to type the same phrase. In conclusion, we have developed a discrete noninvasive wearable device that allows the vocally impaired individuals to communicate in real time.
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Social eye gaze modulates processing of speech and co-speech gesture.
Holler, Judith; Schubotz, Louise; Kelly, Spencer; Hagoort, Peter; Schuetze, Manuela; Özyürek, Aslı
2014-12-01
In human face-to-face communication, language comprehension is a multi-modal, situated activity. However, little is known about how we combine information from different modalities during comprehension, and how perceived communicative intentions, often signaled through visual signals, influence this process. We explored this question by simulating a multi-party communication context in which a speaker alternated her gaze between two recipients. Participants viewed speech-only or speech+gesture object-related messages when being addressed (direct gaze) or unaddressed (gaze averted to other participant). They were then asked to choose which of two object images matched the speaker's preceding message. Unaddressed recipients responded significantly more slowly than addressees for speech-only utterances. However, perceiving the same speech accompanied by gestures sped unaddressed recipients up to a level identical to that of addressees. That is, when unaddressed recipients' speech processing suffers, gestures can enhance the comprehension of a speaker's message. We discuss our findings with respect to two hypotheses attempting to account for how social eye gaze may modulate multi-modal language comprehension. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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Electrophysiological evidence for speech-specific audiovisual integration.
Baart, Martijn; Stekelenburg, Jeroen J; Vroomen, Jean
2014-01-01
Lip-read speech is integrated with heard speech at various neural levels. Here, we investigated the extent to which lip-read induced modulations of the auditory N1 and P2 (measured with EEG) are indicative of speech-specific audiovisual integration, and we explored to what extent the ERPs were modulated by phonetic audiovisual congruency. In order to disentangle speech-specific (phonetic) integration from non-speech integration, we used Sine-Wave Speech (SWS) that was perceived as speech by half of the participants (they were in speech-mode), while the other half was in non-speech mode. Results showed that the N1 obtained with audiovisual stimuli peaked earlier than the N1 evoked by auditory-only stimuli. This lip-read induced speeding up of the N1 occurred for listeners in speech and non-speech mode. In contrast, if listeners were in speech-mode, lip-read speech also modulated the auditory P2, but not if listeners were in non-speech mode, thus revealing speech-specific audiovisual binding. Comparing ERPs for phonetically congruent audiovisual stimuli with ERPs for incongruent stimuli revealed an effect of phonetic stimulus congruency that started at ~200 ms after (in)congruence became apparent. Critically, akin to the P2 suppression, congruency effects were only observed if listeners were in speech mode, and not if they were in non-speech mode. Using identical stimuli, we thus confirm that audiovisual binding involves (partially) different neural mechanisms for sound processing in speech and non-speech mode. © 2013 Published by Elsevier Ltd.
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Brown-Schmidt, Sarah; Canseco-Gonzalez, Enriqueta
2004-03-01
In Mandarin Chinese, word meaning is partially determined by lexical tone (Wang, 1973). Previous studies suggest that lexical tone is processed as linguistic information and not as pure tonal information (Gandour, 1998; Van Lanker & Fromkin, 1973). The current study explored the online processing of lexical tones. Event-related potentials were obtained from 25 Mandarin speakers while they listened to normal and anomalous sentences containing one of three types of semantic anomalies created by manipulating the tone, the syllable, or both tone and syllable (double-anomaly) of sentence-final words. We hypothesized N400 effects elicited by all three types of anomalies and the largest by the double-anomaly. As expected, all three elicited N400 effects starting approximately 150 ms poststimulus and continuing until 1000 ms in some areas. Surprisingly, onset of the double-anomaly effect was approximately 50 ms later than the rest. Delayed detection of errors in this condition may be responsible for the apparent delay. Slight differences between syllable and tone conditions may be due to the relative timing of these acoustic cues.
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Phifer, Gregg, Ed.
The 17 articles in this collection deal with theoretical and practical freedom of speech issues. The topics include: freedom of speech in Marquette Park, Illinois; Nazis in Skokie, Illinois; freedom of expression in the Confederate States of America; Robert M. LaFollette's arguments for free speech and the rights of Congress; the United States…
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Gu, Xin; Liu, Bo; Liu, Ziye; Qi, Beier; Wang, Shuo; Dong, Ruijuan; Chen, Xueqing; Zhou, Qian
2017-12-01
The aim was to evaluate the development of music and lexical tone perception in Mandarin-speaking adult cochlear implant (CI) users over a period of 1 year. Prospective patient series. Tertiary hospital and research institute. Twenty five adult CI users, with ages ranging from 19 to 75 years old, participated in a year-long follow-up evaluation. There were also 40 normal hearing adult subjects who participated as a control group to provide the normal value range. Musical sounds in cochlear implants (Mu.S.I.C.) test battery was undertaken to evaluate music perception ability. Mandarin Tone Identification in Noise Test (M-TINT) was used to assess lexical tone recognition. The tests for CI users were completed at 1, 3, 6, and 12 months after the CI switch-on. Quantitative and statistical analysis of their results from music and tone perception tests. The performance of music perception and tone recognition both demonstrated an overall improvement in outcomes during the entire 1-year follow-up process. The increasing trends were obvious in the early period especially in the first 6 months after switch-on. There was a significant improvement in the melody discrimination (p music and tone perception during the 1-year follow-up. The improvement was the most prominent in the first 6 months of CI use. It is essential to strengthen the rehabilitation training within the first 6 months.
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Liu, Haihong; Liu, Sha; Wang, Suju; Liu, Chang; Kong, Ying; Zhang, Ning; Li, Shujing; Yang, Yilin; Han, Demin; Zhang, Luo
2013-01-01
The purpose of this study was to examine the open-set word recognition performance of Mandarin Chinese-speaking children who had received a multichannel cochlear implant (CI) and examine the effects of lexical characteristics and demographic factors (i.e., age at implantation and duration of implant use) on Mandarin Chinese open-set word recognition in these children. Participants were 230 prelingually deafened children with CIs. Age at implantation ranged from 0.9 to 16.0 years, with a mean of 3.9 years. The Standard-Chinese version of the Monosyllabic Lexical Neighborhood test and the Multisyllabic Lexical Neighborhood test were used to evaluate the open-set word identification abilities of the children. A two-way analysis of variance was performed to delineate the lexical effects on the open-set word identification, with word difficulty and syllable length as the two main factors. The effects of age at implantation and duration of implant use on open-set, word-recognition performance were examined using correlational/regressional models. First, the average percent-correct scores for the disyllabic "easy" list, disyllabic "hard" list, monosyllabic "easy" list, and monosyllabic "hard" list were 65.0%, 51.3%, 58.9%, and 46.2%, respectively. For both the easy and hard lists, the percentage of words correctly identified was higher for disyllabic words than for monosyllabic words, Second, the CI group scored 26.3%, 31.3%, and 18.8 % points lower than their hearing-age-matched normal-hearing peers for 4, 5, and 6 years of hearing age, respectively. The corresponding gaps between the CI group and the chronological-age-matched normal-hearing group were 47.6, 49.6, and 42.4, respectively. The individual variations in performance were much greater in the CI group than in the normal-hearing group, Third, the children exhibited steady improvements in performance as the duration of implant use increased, especially 1 to 6 years postimplantation. Last, age at implantation had
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Drijvers, L.; Özyürek, A.
2017-01-01
Purpose: This study investigated whether and to what extent iconic co-speech gestures contribute to information from visible speech to enhance degraded speech comprehension at different levels of noise-vocoding. Previous studies of the contributions of these 2 visual articulators to speech
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Yang, L; Chen, S; Chen, C-M; Khan, F; Forchelli, G; Javitt, D C
2012-07-01
While 20% of schizophrenia patients worldwide speak tonal languages (e.g. Mandarin), studies are limited to Western-language patients. Western-language patients show tonal deficits that are related to impaired emotional processing of speech. However, language processing is minimally affected. In contrast, in Mandarin, syllables are voiced in one of four tones, with word meaning varying accordingly. We hypothesized that Mandarin-speaking schizophrenia patients would show impairments in underlying basic auditory processing that, unlike in Western groups, would relate to deficits in word recognition and social outcomes. Altogether, 22 Mandarin-speaking schizophrenia patients and 44 matched healthy participants were recruited from New York City. The auditory tasks were: (1) tone matching; (2) distorted tunes; (3) Chinese word discrimination; (4) Chinese word identification. Social outcomes were measured by marital status, employment and most recent employment status. Patients showed deficits in tone-matching, distorted tunes, word discrimination and word identification versus controls (all pneuropsychology and language among Mandarin-speaking schizophrenia patients. As predicted, patients were highly impaired in both tone and auditory word processing, with these two measures significantly correlated. Tonally impaired patients showed significantly worse employment-status function than tonally intact patients, suggesting a link between sensory impairment and employment status outcome. While neuropsychological deficits appear similar cross-culturally, their consequences may be language- and culture-dependent.