While voicing contrasts in word-onset position are acquired relatively early, much less is known about how and when they are acquired in word-coda position, where accurate production of these contrasts is also critical for distinguishing words (e.g., dog vs. dock). This study examined how the acoustic cues to coda voicing contrasts are realized in…

Lexical tones are widely believed to be a formidable learning challenge for adult speakers of nontonal languages. While difficulties--as well as rapid improvements--are well documented for beginning second language (L2) learners, research with more advanced learners is needed to understand how tone perception difficulties impact word recognition…

The goal of this dissertation is to better understand the targets of vowels in speech production. Three experiments investigate vowel production in non-native speech, probing how new vowel categories, and thus targets, are formed. Three research questions are addressed: (1) Do vowels have articulatory targets (as predicted by Browman &…

Lexical access is highly contextual. For example, vowel (rime) information is prioritized over tone in the lexical access of isolated words in Mandarin Chinese, but these roles are flipped in constraining contexts. The time course of these contextual effects remains unclear, and so here we tracked the real-time eye gaze of native Mandarin speakers…

This paper explored and analyzed features of English pronunciation that could cause intelligibility problems for Nepali English learners (ELs), who use English as a foreign language (EFL) or English as a second language (ESL). We examined the Nepali ELs' pronunciation issues by juxtaposing them with comparable segmental and suprasegmental features…

Purpose: This study aimed to determine how tongue and jaw displacement changes impact acoustic vowel contrast in talkers with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and controls. Method: Ten talkers with ALS and 14 controls participated in this study. Loud, clear, and slow speech cues were used to elicit tongue and jaw kinematic as well as acoustic…

Purpose: Given the established linear relationship between neck surface vibration magnitude and mean subglottal pressure (Ps) in vocally healthy speakers, the purpose of this study was to better understand the impact of the presence of a voice disorder on this baseline relationship. Method: Data were obtained from participants with voice disorders…

Programs for teaching English reading, especially for students with dyslexia, and educational practice standards often recommend instruction on dividing polysyllabic words into syllables. Syllable division is effort intensive and could inhibit fluency when reading in text. The division strategies might still be useful if they work so consistently…

Purpose: The purpose of the current study was to characterize clear speech production for speakers with and without Parkinson disease (PD) using several measures of working vowel space computed from frequently sampled formant trajectories. Method: The 1st 2 formant frequencies were tracked for a reading passage that was produced using habitual and…

Recent work has shown that retrieval hints can make test trials more enjoyable without sacrificing learning. We investigated the extent to which this effect was moderated by hint strength. Both experiments utilized a within-participants design. In Experiment 1 (n = 41), participants studied skeletal charts highlighting a bone region. After study,…

Purpose: Delayed auditory feedback (DAF) interferes with speech output. DAF causes distorted and disfluent productions and errors in the serial order of produced sounds. Although DAF has been studied extensively, the specific patterns of elicited speech errors are somewhat obscured by relatively small speech samples, differences across studies,…

The purpose of this study is to investigate the uniqueness of the pop singing genre by determining the role of the Chinese language in the creation of popular singing in education with modern innovative technologies. The paper began by determining which types of popular music were the most popular among respondents and the influence of modern…

Purpose: The aim of the study was to examine associations between speaking fundamental frequency (f[subscript os]), vowel formant frequencies (F), listener perceptions of speaker gender, and vocal femininity-masculinity. Method: An exploratory study was undertaken to examine associations between f[subscript os], F[subscript 1]-F[subscript 3],…

This article examines whether children alter a variable phonological pattern in an artificial language towards a phonetically-natural form. We address acquisition of a variable rounding harmony pattern through the use of two artificial languages; one with dominant harmony pattern, and another with dominant non-harmony pattern. Overall, children…

Infants born after fetal growth restriction (FGR)--an obstetric condition defined as the failure to achieve the genetic growth potential--are prone to neurodevelopmental delays, with language being one of the major affected areas. Yet, while verbal comprehension and expressive language impairments have been observed in FGR infants, children and…