Modeling Phonetic Structure Using Articulatory Dynamics

研究人员将继续发展语音结构的计算模型，并利用它来帮助理解发生在各种语言中的某些类型的发音同化。该模型基于一种称为任务动力学的特殊动态系统方法，该方法根据语音产生过程中发音器运动的协调模式抽象地表征语音手势。组成给定话语的手势的相对时间和参数化由模型的语言手势成分生成的手势分数指定。为了将该模型应用于同化，研究人员计划收集英语、俄语、阿拉伯语和西班牙语使用者的手势结构（由模型定义）作为各种条件（如语速和韵律结构）的函数所表现出的变化的数据。他们将模拟观察到的变化模式。因为该模型在手势规范和声音输出之间提供了明确的、原则性的联系，它可以用来测试变化模式如何引起同化的感知。

The investigators will continue the development of a computational model of phonetic structure, and employ it to help understand certain kinds of place of articulation assimilation that occur in various languages. The model is based on a particular dynamical systems approach called task dynamics, which abstractly characterizes speech gestures in terms of coordinated patterns of articulator movements during speech production. The relative timing and parameterization of the gestures comprising a given utterance are specified by a gestural score that is generated by the model's linguistic gestural component. To apply the model to assimilation, the investigators plan to collect data on the variation exhibited by the gestural structures (as defined by the model) as a function of variety of conditions, such as speaking rate and prosodic structure, from speakers of English, Russian, Arabic, and Spanish. They will model the observed patterns of variation. Because the model provides an explicit, principled connection between gestural specification and an acoustic output, it can be used to test how patterns of variation give rise to the percept of assimilation.