Speech Science Flashcards
What are the smallest units of sound that can affect meaning?
phonemes
What are variations of phonemes called, that do not change word meaning?
allophones
What are the four components of sound intelligibility?
respiration, phonation, articulation and resonation
What is the smallest phonetic unit?
syllable
What is a nucleus?
vowel or dipthong in the middle of a syllable
What is a coda?
consonant at the end of a syllable
What sounds need an accompaniement to function?
consonants
What is syllabification?
skill involved in identifying the number of syllables in words
What is distinctive feature analysis?
a system for classifying speech sounds, each phoneme is a collection of independent features
What type of system is distinctive feature analysis?
binary system, presence of a feature is noted by a + or -
What is place-manner-voice analysis?
categorizes consonants in terms of three parameters: place, voice, manner
How is /l/ produced?
placing the front of the tongue against the alveolar ridge and lowering the midsection of the tongue bilaterally.
What are back sounds?
k, g, ng,
What are continuants?
produced with an incomplete point of constriction and airflow is not stopped. /h, r, l, s, z, f, v, w, j, j, 3,sh, th/
What are coronal sounds?
Sounds are produced with the tongue blade raised above the neutral schwa position.
What are tense sounds?
produced with a relatively greater degree of contraction or muscle tension at the root of the tongue
What are high consonants?
k,g,ng,sh,j,ch
What are strident sounds?
ch, d3, 3, sh, s, z, f, v, sounds are produced by forcing the airstream through a small, constricted opening, resulting in an intense noise
What are sonorants?
Produced by allowing the airstream to pass relatively uninterrupted through the nasal or oral cavity with no stoppage point, n,m,ng, l, r, w, j
What sounds are interrupted sounds?
Stops and affricates
what are obstruents?
affricates, fricatives, and stops
What are sibilants?
high frequency sounds that have longer duration and more stidency, ch, d3, s, z, sh, 3
What are approximations?
glides and liquids, they are named such because of the approximating nature of the contact between the two articulators that help form them
What does rhotic refer to?
sometimes used to describe /r/ and its allophonic variations
What are the different distinctive feature analysis?
vocalics, sonorants, voiced, rounded, tense, front, back, high vowels, low vowels, rhotic
What are different vowel characteristic descriptions?
lip position, tense/lax, tongue height, tongue forwardness or retraction
What is the difference between tense and lax vowels?
tense vowels have longer duration and are produced with increased tension while lax vowels are of shorter duration and are produced with relatively less muscular tension
What are front vowels?
I, i, e, E, ae
What are central vowels?
Er, er, schwa, v
What are back vowels?
u, U, o, oc, a
What are dipthongs?
Slow gliding movement from one vowel to the adjacent vowel
What is the difference between phonemic and nonphonemic dipthongs?
phonemic dipthongs cannot be reduced to pure vowels without changing word meaning, nonphonemic dipthongs do not change word meanings
What are phonetic adaptations?
two types of variations according to preceeding and following sounds, variations in the way articulators move and the extent to which vocal tract configurations change shape. Adjacent vowels influence productions
What is assimilation?
Speech sounds are modified due to the influence of adjacent sounds. modifications are so extensive that there are perceptible changes in sounds
What is coarticulation?
The influence of one phoneme upon another phoneme in production or perception. In coarticulation, two different articulators move simultaneously to produce two different speech sounds. Coarticulation creates both adaptation and assimilation
What are suprasegmentals?
features of prosody, add meaning, variety, and color to running speech. They involved larger units as syllables, words, phrases, and sentences than individual units
What are the most commonly described suprasegmentals?
length, stress, rate, pitch, volume, and juncture
If a syllable has a long vowel what kind of consonant does it have?
short
What are the four components of a stressed syllable?
loud, longer, higher in pitch, greater muscular effort
What is a formant frequency?
frequency region with concentrated acousitc energy, the center frequency of a formant, which is a resonance
What harmonic is the fundamental frequency?
first harmonic
What is resonance?
The modification of sound by other sources
What is a cycle of vibrations called?
Hertz
What is a tone called that has a single frequency?
pure tone
what is a complex tone?
When two or more single frequency tones of differing frequencies
What is frequency?
number of cycles per second, measures in Hz
What is pitch?
Variations in frequency
What frequencies is the human ear tuned to hear?
20Hz to 20000Hz, sensitive to changes below 1000Hz
How is sound pressure described?
DBSPL
What graphically records changing intensity levels of the frquency components in a complex sound wave?
sound spectograph
What 3 dimensions does a spectograph show?
time(horizontal), intensity (gray scale), frequency (vertical)
what is fundamental frequency?
the lowest component frequency of a periodic wave, it is the tone produced by the vocal folds, or the first harmonic.
what are whole number multiples of the fundamental frequency?
harmonic
What type of speech is associated with steady-state acoustic patterns and steady state articulatory patterns?
vowels
what harmonics are vowels described by?
harmonics 1, 2, 3
What happens to the fundamental frequency of high vowels?
they are higher
What influences different formants in vowels?
F1 varies by tongue height, F2 varies by tongue advancement
What is voice onset time?
the time between the release of the stop consonant and the beginning of the vowel . The time required to initiate sound at the vocal fold level.
