Browsing by Person "Schaeffler, Sonja"

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Adult speakers' tongue-palate contact patterns for bilabial stops within complex clusters
(2009-12-09) Zharkova, Natalia; Schaeffler, Sonja; Gibbon, Fiona
Previous studies using Electropalatography (EPG) have shown that individuals with speech disorders sometimes produce articulation errors that affect bilabial targets, but currently there is limited normative data available. In this study, EPG and acoustic data were recorded during complex word final sps clusters spoken by 20 normal adults. A total contact (TC) index measured amount of tongue-palate contact during clusters in words such as 'crisps'. Bilabial closure was inferred from the acoustic signal. The TC profiles indicated that normal adults hold their tongues in a steady /s/-like position throughout the cluster; most speakers (85, n17) had no significant difference in TC values during bilabial closure compared to flanking fricatives. The results are interpreted as showing that normal speakers produce double bilabial-alveolar articulations for /p/ in these clusters. Although steady state TC profiles were typical of the group, absolute TC values varied considerably between speakers, with some speakers having up to three times more contact than others. These findings add to the knowledge about normal articulation, and will help to improve diagnosis and treatment of individuals with speech disorders.
An Evaluation of Inter-Speech Postures for the Study of Language-Specific Articulatory Settings.
(2008) Schaeffler, Sonja; Scobbie, James M.; Mennen, Ineke
We present a methodological study evaluating Inter-Speech Postures, i.e. vocal-tract configurations achieved in the silent preparation for speech which have been claimed to be indicative of articulatory settings. The term articulatory setting refers to a characteristic use of the articulators believed to shape the overall phonetic realisation of a language and with that, possibly, its 'typical sound' [3].
Articulatory consequences of prediction during comprehension
(University of Glasgow: Glasgow, 2015-08-10) Drake, Eleanor; Schaeffler, Sonja; Corley, Martin
It has been proposed that speech-motor activation observed during comprehension may, in part, reflect involvement of the speech-motor system in the top-down simulation of upcoming material [14]. In the current study we employed an automated approach to the analysis of ultrasound tongue imaging in order to investigate whether comprehension-elicited effects are observable at an articulatory-output level. We investigated whether and how lexical predictions affect speech-motor output. Effects were found at a relatively early point during the pre-acoustic phase of articulation, and did not appear to be predicated upon the nature of the phonological-overlap between predicted and named items. In these respects effects related to comprehension-elicited predictions appear to differ in nature from those observed in production and perception experiments.
Articulatory Effects of Prediction During Comprehension: An Ultrasound Tongue Imaging Approach
(2014-05) Drake, Eleanor; Schaeffler, Sonja; Corley, Martin
We investigated whether effects of prediction during spoken language comprehension are observable in speech-motor output recorded via ultrasound tongue imaging: Predicted words can be specified at a phonological level during reading comprehension, and listening to speech activates speechmotor regions. It has been suggested that speech-motor activation may occur during prediction of upcoming material (Pickering & Garrod, 2007). Speakers model their own upcoming speech, with the effects being observable at an articulatory level in the form of anticipatory co-articulation. We investigated whether the effects of prediction as a listener can also be observed at an articulatory level. We auditorily presented high-cloze sentence-stems, immediately followed by presentation of a picture for naming. Picture names either fully matched the omitted sentence-cloze item or mismatched it at onset (e.g., TAP-cap-). By-condition differences in picture-name articulation indicated that prediction of upcoming material during speech listening can engage speechmotor processes
Audible aspects of speech preparation
(2011-08) Scobbie, James M.; Schaeffler, Sonja; Mennen, Ineke; ESRC (RES-000-22-3032)
Noises made before the acoustic onset of speech are typically ignored, yet may reveal aspects of speech production planning and be relevant to dis-course turn-taking. We quantify the nature and tim-ing of such noises, using an experimental method designed to elicit naturalistic yet controlled speech initiation data. Speakers listened to speech input, then spoke when prompt material became visible onscreen. They generally inhaled audibly before uttering a short sentence, but not before a single word. In both tasks, articulatory movements caused acoustic spikes due to weak click-like articulatory separations or stronger clicks via an ingressive, lingual airstream. The acoustic onset of the sen-tences was delayed relative to the words. This does not appear to be planned, but seems a side-effect of the longer duration of inhalation.
Comparing Vocal Health and Attitudes to Voice care in Primary Teachers and Voiceover Artists – A Survey Study Using the Health Belief Model
(Elsevier, 2023-03-19) Schaeffler, Felix; Parry, Anna M.; Beck, Janet M.; Rees, Meagan; Schaeffler, Sonja; Whittaker, Tess
Objectives A range of professions experience high demands on their voices and are potentially at risk of developing voice disorders. Teachers have been studied extensively in this respect, while voiceover artists are a growing professional group with unknown levels of voice training, voice problems and voice care attitudes. To better understand profession-specific voice care requirements, we compared voice training, voice care habits and self-reported voice problems of these two professional groups and measured attitudes to voice care, informed by the Health Belief Model (HBM). Study design The study was a cross-sectional survey study with two cohorts. Methods We surveyed 264 Scottish primary school teachers and 96 UK voiceover artists . Responses were obtained with multiple-choice and free-text questions. Attitudes to voice care were assessed with Likert-type questions that addressed five dimensions of the HBM. Results Most voiceover artists had some level of voice training, compared to a minority of teachers. Low numbers of teachers reported regular voice care, compared to over half of voiceover artists. Higher numbers of teachers reported work-related voice problems. Voiceover artists reported greater awareness for vocal health and perceived potential effects of voice problems on their work as more severe. Voiceover artists also saw voice care as more beneficial. Teachers perceived barriers to voice care as substantially higher and felt less confident about voice care. Teachers with existing voice problems showed increased perceptions of voice problem susceptibility and severity and saw more benefit in voice care. Cronbach's alpha was below 0.7 for about half of the HBM-informed survey subsets, suggesting that reliability could be improved. Conclusions Both groups reported substantial levels of voice problems, and different attitudes to voice care suggest that the two groups require different approaches to preventative intervention. Future studies will benefit from the inclusion of further attitude dimensions beyond the HBM.
Complex patterns in silent speech preparation: Preparing for fast response might be different to preparing for fast speech in a reaction time experiment
(International Phonetic Association, 2015-08-15) Schaeffler, Sonja; Scobbie, James M.; Schaeffler, Felix
This paper presents articulatory data on silent preparation in a standard Verbal Reaction Time experiment. We have reported in a previous study [6] that Reaction Time is reliably detectable in Ultrasound Tongue Imaging and lip video data, and between 120 to 180 ms ahead of the standard acoustics-based measurements. The aim of the current study was to investigate in more detail how silent speech preparation is timed in relation to faster and slower Reaction Times, and faster and slower articulation rates of the verbal response. The results suggest that the standard acoustic-based measurements of Reaction Time may not only routinely underestimate fastness of response but also obscure considerable variation in actual response behaviour. Particularly tokens with fast Reaction Times seem to exhibit substantial variation with respect to when the response is actually initiated, i.e. detectable in the articulatory data.
Does Child-Directed Speech Facilitate Language Development in All Domains? A Study Space Analysis of the Existing Evidence
(Elsevier, 2024-03-04) Kempe, Vera; Ota, Mitsuhiko; Schaeffler, Sonja
Because child-directed speech (CDS) is ubiquitous in some cultures and because positive associations between certain features of the language input and certain learning outcomes have been attested it has often been claimed that the function of CDS is to aid children’s language development in general. We argue that for this claim to be generalisable, superior learning from CDS compared to non-CDS, such as adult-directed speech (ADS), must be demonstrated across multiple input domains and learning outcomes. To determine the availability of such evidence we performed a study space analysis of the research literature on CDS. A total of 942 relevant papers were coded with respect to (i) CDS features under consideration, (ii) learning outcomes and (iii) whether a comparison between CDS and ADS was reported. The results show that only 16.2% of peer-reviewed studies in this field compared learning outcomes between CDS and ADS, almost half of which focussed on the ability to discriminate between the two registers. Crucially, we found only 20 studies comparing learning outcomes between CDS and ADS for morphosyntactic and lexico-semantic features and none for pragmatic and extra-linguistic features. Although these 20 studies provided preliminary evidence for a facilitative effect of some specific morphosyntactic and lexico-semantic features, overall CDS-ADS comparison studies are very unevenly distributed across the space of CDS features and outcome measures. The disproportional emphasis on prosodic, phonetic, and phonological input features, and register discrimination as the outcome invites caution with respect to the generalisability of the claim that CDS facilitates language development across the breadth of input domains and learning outcomes. Future research ought to resolve the discrepancy between sweeping claims about the function of CDS as facilitating language development on the one hand and the narrow evidence base for such a claim on the other by conducting CDS-ADS comparisons across a wider range of input features and outcome measures.
Does child-directed speech facilitate language development in all domains? A study space analysis of the existing evidence
(2024-02-29) Kempe, Vera; Ota, Mitsuhiko; Schaeffler, Sonja
Data related to the paper: Kempe, V., Ota, M. and Schaeffler, S. (2024) ‘Does Child-Directed Speech Facilitate Language Development in All Domains? A Study Space Analysis of the Existing Evidence’, Developmental Review [Preprint].
Effect of phonetic onset on acoustic and articulatory speech reaction times studied with tongue ultrasound
(International Phonetic Association, 2015-08-15) Palo, Pertti; Schaeffler, Sonja; Scobbie, James M.
We study the effect that phonetic onset has on acoustic and articulatory reaction times. An acoustic study by Rastle et al. (2005) shows that the place and manner of the first consonant in a target affects acoustic RT. An articulatory study by Kawamoto et al. (2008) shows that the same effect is not present in articulatory reaction time of the lips. We hypothesise, therefore, that in a replication with articulatory instrumentation for the tongue, we should find the same acoustic effect, but no effect in the articulatory reaction time. As a proof of concept of articulatory measurement from ultrasound images, we report results from a pilot experiment which also extends the dataset to include onset-less syllables. The hypothesis is essentially confirmed with statistical analysis and we explore and discuss the effect of different vowels and onset types (including null onsets) on articulatory and acoustic RT and speech production.
English (Scottish) speech development
(Oxford University Press, 2024) Scobbie, James M.; Cleland, Joanne; Lawson, Eleanor; Schaeffler, Sonja; McLeod, Sharynne
Scottish English is primarily spoken in Scotland, U.K. It is a national quasi-standard variety of English with a range of social and geographical variants. It can be characterized as a highly distinctive accent (or accent group) of English, mainly due to its relationship to Scots. Its strongly distinct character may be more phonetic, prosodic and lexical than strictly phonemic and phonological, so for practical reasons it can be assumed that its inventory and consonant phonotactics overlap sufficiently with other varieties for many “British English” clinical resources to be applicable. Scottish English is, however, rhotic in its prestige varieties, which makes it markedly different from non-rhotic Southern Standard British English and other non-rhotic varieties. There are few specific studies of children’s acquisition of Scottish English, though Scottish children are often incorporated in larger studies in the U.K. Research on Scottish English has focused on social variation, speech production, and remediation techniques augmented with real time visual biofeedback, involving children with speech sound disorders and cleft palate. Commonly-used speech assessments and interventions have not been developed specifically for this variety of English.
Is the Past a Different Culture? Tracking Changes in Prosodic Features of Child-Directed Broadcasting Across Six Decades
(University of California, 2025) Kempe, Vera; Gravelle, C. Donnan; Perschke, Stina; Williams, Glenn; Schaeffler, Sonja
While research has explored cross-cultural variation in childdirected speech (CDS), little is known about if and how it may have changed over time. We explore whether CDS has undergone historical change by analyzing prosodic features in child-directed (CD) broadcasts from a German children’s bedtime program (1959–present) and comparing them to adultdirected (AD) weather forecasts from the same period. The program originated in East Germany and continued after German reunification in 1990, potentially reflecting a sociocultural shift toward more child-centric attitudes characteristic of Western liberal democracies. Pitch variation in CD broadcasts, although higher than in AD broadcasts, remained stable over time. In contrast, articulation rates showed no register difference pre-1990; only after 1990 did CD broadcasts exhibit the slower articulation rates typical of CDS. This suggests that some features of CDS may be subject to cultural evolution over historical time, which can be accelerated by major historical events.
Is the Past a Different Culture? Tracking Changes in Prosodic Features of Child-Directed Broadcasting Across Six Decades [Dataset]
(2025) Kempe, Vera; Gravelle, C. Donnan; Perschke, Stina; Williams, Glenn; Schaeffler, Sonja
Supplementary data for: https://eresearch.qmu.ac.uk/handle/20.500.12289/14247 Kempe, V., Gravelle, C.D., Perschke, S., Williams, G. and Schaeffler, S. (2025) ‘Is the Past a Different Culture? Tracking Changes in Prosodic Features of ChildDirected Broadcasting Across Six Decades’, Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, 47. is available at: https://osf.io/59wsb/ .
Male facial attractiveness, perceived personality, and child-directed speech.
(Elsevier, 2007-07) Penton-Voak, Ian S.; Cahill, Stephanie; Pound, Nicholas; Kempe, Vera; Schaeffler, Sonja; Schaeffler, Felix
This study investigated associations between men's facial attractiveness, perceived personality, attitudes towards children, and the quality of their child-directed (CD) speech. Sixty-three males were photographed and completed a brief questionnaire concerning their family background and attitudes towards children. They then performed a task in which they gave directions to (imaginary) adults and children. Analyses of the acoustic properties of speech produced under each condition were performed in order to determine the extent to which individual men changed their speech to accommodate a child listener (i.e., exhibited CD speech). The men's faces were rated by 59 female participants, who assessed perceived prosociality, masculinity, health, and short- and long-term attractiveness. Although women's ratings of attractiveness and prosociality were related to men's self-reported liking for children, they were negatively correlated to men's use of CD speech (i.e., less attractive men used more features of CD speech when addressing an imaginary child). These findings are discussed in the context of halo effects and strategic pluralism in male mating behaviors.
Measuring language-specific phonetic settings
(2010-01) Mennen, Ineke; Scobbie, James M.; de Leeuw, Esther; Schaeffler, Sonja; Schaeffler, Felix
While it is well known that languages have different phonemes and phonologies, there is growing interest in the idea that languages may also differ in their 'phonetic setting'. The term 'phonetic setting' refers to a tendency to make the vocal apparatus employ a language-specific habitual configuration. For example, languages may differ in their degree of lip-rounding, tension of the lips and tongue, jaw position, phonation types, pitch range and register. Such phonetic specifications may be particularly difficult for second language (L2) learners to acquire, yet be easily perceivable by first language (L1) listeners as inappropriate. Techniques that are able to capture whether and how an L2 learner's pronunciation proficiency in their two languages relates to the respective phonetic settings in each language should prove useful for second language research. This article gives an overview of a selection of techniques that can be used to investigate phonetic settings at the articulatory level, such as flesh-point tracking, ultrasound tongue imaging and electropalatography (EPG), as well as a selection of acoustic measures such as measures of pitch range, long-term average spectra and formants. The Author(s), 2010.
Measuring reaction times: Vocalisation vs. articulation
(2014-05-09) Schaeffler, Sonja; Scobbie, James M.; Schaeffler, Felix; Fuchs, S.; Grice, M.; Hermes, A.; Lancia, L.; Mücke, D.
There is a sizeable delay between any formulation of an intention to speak and the audible vocalisation that results. Silent articulatory movements in preparation for audible speech comprise a proportion of this phase of speech production. The extensive literature on Reaction Time (RT) is based on the delay between a stimulus and the acoustic onset to speech that is elicited, ignoring the preceding silent elements of speech production in what is an utterance-initial position. We used a standard Snodgrass and Vanderwart picture-naming task to elicit speech in a standard Reaction Time protocol, but recorded the behaviour of two typical speakers with audio plus Ultrasound Tongue Imaging (201 frames per second) and de-interlaced NTSC video of the mouth and lips (60fps). On average, acoustic RT occurred between 120 to 180 ms later than a clearly observable articulatory movement, with no consistent advantage for lip or tongue-based measures.
Mothers are less efficient in employing prosodic disambiguation in child-directed speech than non-mothers : is there a trade-off between affective and linguistic prosody?
(2007-08) Schaeffler, Sonja; Kempe, Vera
This study examines prosodic disambiguation in child-directed (CD) speech. Twenty-four mothers addressed syntactically ambiguous sentences to their 2;0 to 3;8 year old child and to an adult confederate. Twenty-four non-mothers addressed an imaginary toddler and an imaginary adult. We found that only mothers increased pitch and produced the CD-typical pitch excursions when addressing their children. In contrast, non-mothers, but not mothers, used prosodic disambiguation in CD speech, which was corroborated by a forced choice test in which 48 listeners judged the intended meaning of each sentence. The results suggest that if speakers express genuine positive affect, they tend to emphasise affective prosody at the expense of linguistic prosody. In the case of CD speech, this communication strategy may be more effective as it serves to elicit the child's attention.
Mothers, adults, children, pets - towards the acoustics of intimacy
(2008) Batliner, Anton; Schuller, Bjorn; Schaeffler, Sonja; Steidl, Stefan
In this paper, we investigate acoustic features which differentiate the two speech registers neutral and intimate within different constellations of speakers and addressees. Three different types of speakers are considered: mothers addressing their own children or an unknown adult, women with no children addressing an imaginary child or an imaginary adult, and children addressing a pet robot using both intimate and neutral speech. We use a large, systematically generated feature vector, upsampling, and SVM and RF for learning. Results are reported for extensive test-runs facing speaker-independency and using PCA-SFFS vs. SVM-SFFS for feature ranking. Classification performance and most relevant feature types are discussed in detail. 2008 IEEE.
Pre-speech tongue movements recorded with ultrasound
(2014-05-09) Palo, Pertti; Schaeffler, Sonja; Scobbie, James M.; Fuchs, S.; Grice, M.; Hermes, A.; Lancia, L.; Mücke, D.
We analyse Ultrasound Tongue Imaging (UTI) data from five speakers, whose native languages (L1) are English (3 peakers), German (1 speaker), and Finnish (1 speaker). The data consist of single words spoken in the subjects' respective native tongues as responses to a picture naming task. The focus of this study is on automating the analysis of ultrasound recordings of tongue movements that take place after the subject is presented with a stimulus. We analyse these movements with a pixel difference method (McMillan and Corley 2010; Drake, Schaeffler, and Corley 2013a; Drake, Schaeffler, and Corley 2013b), which yields an estimate on the rate of change on a frame by frame basis. We describe typical time dependent pixel difference contours and report grand average contours for each of the speakers.
Prosodic disambiguation in child-directed speech
(2010) Kempe, Vera; Schaeffler, Sonja; Thoresen, John C.
The study examines whether speakers exaggerate prosodic cues to syntactic structure when addressing young children. In four experiments, 72 mothers and 48 non-mothers addressed either real 2-4-year old or imaginary children as well as adult confederates using syntactically ambiguous sentences like Touch the cat with the spoon intending to convey either an instrument (high attachment) or a modifier (low attachment) interpretation. Mothers produced longer segments and pauses in child-directed speech (CDS) compared to adult-directed speech (ADS). However, in CDS, mothers lengthened post-nominal pauses in both the instrument and the modifier sentences to a similar extent thereby failing to disambiguate between the two interpretations. In contrast, non-mothers provided reliable prosodic disambiguation cues in CDS by producing post-nominal pauses that were longer in instrument than modifier sentences. Experiment 5, using ratings from 50 participants, determined that expressed positive affect was higher in the CDS of mothers than of non-mothers. Negative correlations between vocal affect and degree of prosodic disambiguation in CDS compared to ADS suggest that there may be a trade-off between affective and linguistic prosody such that greater dominance of affective prosody may limit the informativeness of prosodic cues as markers of syntactic structure. 2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.