Speech Reduction across Languages and Dialects

跨语言和方言的语音缩减

• 批准号: 1022313
• 负责人: Natasha Warner
• 金额: $ 22.7万
• 依托单位: University of Arizona
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2010
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2010-09-01 至 2016-02-29
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1022313&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Speech; Reduction; across; Languages; Dialects

The speech humans produce every day in casual conversation is incredibly varied, with sounds and whole syllables changed or missing. American English listeners notice nothing unusual when hearing such "reduced speech" in context; however, second-language speakers and even listeners from other English-speaking countries often find American English reduced speech difficult to understand. The current research centers on how speakers and listeners use reduced, spontaneous speech across languages and dialects, and on how such speech may hinder or even facilitate communication among speakers of different backgrounds. The project will test speakers of Dutch, Spanish, Japanese, and three dialects of English to determine 1) to what extent reduction is language-specific and part of the grammar rather than random or physically-determined variability, 2) whether the sound patterns of the native language influence phonetic variability at the level of spontaneous speech in the second language, 3) how strongly dialect affects understanding of reduced speech, and 4) how degree of proficiency, years of experience, strength of ethnic/national identity, etc. affect production and understanding of reduction. The overarching theoretical question is, what is part of the learned grammar and what is low-level variability. Furthermore, the project will provide data on theoretical questions about exemplar models of speech perception, mutual effects between speakers' first and second languages, and articulatory planning. Through globalization, immigration, and telecommunications, humans in the modern world often interact across language backgrounds. Native English speakers interact with non-native speakers and speakers of different English dialects interact with each other. The current project addresses how humans handle the variability of conversational speech in communicative situations. Detailed knowledge of natural, reduced speech, gained through this project, will impact speech technology and how humans interact with computers by voice, benefiting speech synthesis and automatic recognition of spontaneous speech. Because the project includes extensive investigation of English proficiency and language background for the experiment participants, it will also shed light on what factors make it easier or harder for non-native listeners to understand conversational speech in their second language. This project forms a synergistic international collaborative group to answer these questions.

人类每天在随意交谈中发出的言语千差万别，声音和整个音节都会改变或缺失。美式英语听众在上下文中听到这种“简化的言语”时并没有注意到任何异常。然而，第二语言的使用者甚至来自其他英语国家的听众常常发现美式英语精简语音难以理解。目前的研究重点是说话者和听众如何在不同语言和方言中使用减少的、自发的语音，以及这种语音如何阻碍甚至促进不同背景的说话者之间的交流。该项目将测试荷兰语、西班牙语、日语和三种英语方言的使用者，以确定 1) 减少在多大程度上是特定于语言的，是语法的一部分，而不是随机或物理确定的变异性；2) 母语的声音模式是否影响第二语言自发语音水平的语音变异；3) 方言对减少语音的理解的影响有多大；4) 熟练程度、经验年限、语言强度如何。 种族/民族认同等影响减排的生产和理解。最重要的理论问题是，什么是所学语法的一部分，什么是低级变异性。此外，该项目还将提供有关语音感知范例模型、说话者第一语言和第二语言之间的相互影响以及发音规划等理论问题的数据。通过全球化、移民和电信，现代世界的人类经常跨越语言背景进行互动。英语为母语的人与非英语为母语的人互动，不同英语方言的人也相互互动。当前的项目致力于解决人类如何处理交流情境中对话语音的可变性。通过该项目获得的自然简化语音的详细知识将影响语音技术以及人类如何通过语音与计算机交互，从而有利于语音合成和自发语音的自动识别。由于该项目包括对实验参与者的英语水平和语言背景的广泛调查，因此它还将揭示哪些因素使非母语听众更容易或更难理解第二语言的对话语音。该项目组建了一个协同国际合作小组来回答这些问题。