Development and Perceptual Evaluation of Amplitude-Based F0 Control in Electrolarynx Speech

Autor/inn/en	Saikachi, Yoko; Stevens, Kenneth N.; Hillman, Robert E.
Titel	Development and Perceptual Evaluation of Amplitude-Based F0 Control in Electrolarynx Speech
Quelle	In: Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 52 (2009) 5, S.1360-1369 (10 Seiten) PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	1092-4388
DOI	10.1044/1092-4388(2009/08-0167)
Schlagwörter	Speech; Assistive Technology; Acoustics; Males; Sentences; Surgery; Perception; Experiments + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Speaking; Sprechen; Akustik; Male; Männliches Geschlecht; Sentence analysis; Satzanalyse; Chirurgie; Wahrnehmung; Erprobung
Abstract	Purpose: Current electrolarynx (EL) devices produce a mechanical speech quality that has been largely attributed to the lack of natural fundamental frequency (F0) variation. In order to improve the quality of EL speech, in the present study the authors aimed to develop and evaluate an automatic F0 control scheme, in which F0 was modulated based on variations in the root-mean-square (RMS) amplitude of the EL speech signal. Method: Recordings of declarative sentences produced by 2 male participants before and after total laryngectomy were used to develop procedures for calculating F0 contours for EL speech. Specifically, the positive linear relationship between F0 and RMS amplitude observed in pre-laryngectomy speech was used as the basis for generating an F0 contour based on the amplitude variation of EL speech. An analysis-by-synthesis approach was used to modify the F0 contour, and a perceptual experiment was conducted to examine its impact on the quality of the EL speech. Results: The results of perceptual experiments showed that modulating the F0 of EL speech using a linear relationship between amplitude and frequency made it significantly more natural sounding than EL speech with constant F0. Conclusions: The current study provides preliminary support for amplitude-based control of F0 in EL speech. (As Provided).
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Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2017/4/10