Communicating pitch in clear speech: articulation, acoustics, intelligibility, neuro-processing, and computational modeling

言语交际涉及多种风格，这些风格是不同的说话环境和交际需要的函数。在嘈杂的环境中，或与听力受损或非母语的感知者互动时，说话者经常使用清晰的言语风格来改变他们的言语产出，从而导致视觉发音和声学变化。这样的修改可以增强语音清晰度，因为感知器利用来自说话者面部和声音的清晰语音提示。然而，过度夸张的清晰语音导致不同声音类别的重叠，或注意到不正确的语音提示，可能会抑制可懂度。 本研究旨在探讨清晰语音在音高相关信息交流中的作用。我们的目标是确定扬声器如何修改他们的音调生产，同时仍然保持音调类别的区别，以及感知器如何利用音调增强和分类线索，从不同形式的输入在具有挑战性的听力条件。这些问题将在一系列相互关联的研究中得到解决，这些研究涉及清晰语音音调的清晰度、声学、可懂度和神经处理。 录音录像将与母语为汉语普通话的人一起制作，以清晰和对话的方式制作普通话音调。演讲者的面部发音运动的视频清晰和会话的语气生产将使用创新的计算机图像处理技术进行检查。音调产生的声学相关性将通过计算机声学测量进行分析。听觉-视觉可懂度数据将在具有感知挑战性的条件下收集：自助餐厅背景噪音和非母语环境。清晰语音音调的神经处理将通过电生理学研究进行检查。最后，发音，声学，感知和神经数据将相关的统计模型，以确定哪些发音和声学清晰的语音提示有助于提高可懂度和神经敏感性的词汇音调。 本研究对语音科学、通信学、神经科学、计算机语音技术和语音工程等领域具有重要意义。感知者如何平衡音调增强线索和分类音调差异的研究结果提供了对感觉运动和认知处理的相互作用如何由低级和高级大脑机制协调的见解。在实践方面，这项研究将告知如何在不同的交际环境中有效地应用语音增强原理来开发语音技术，语言学习和教学、语言治疗和人机界面。

Speech communication involves multiple styles as a function of different speaking environments and communicative needs. In noisy environments, or interacting with hearing-impaired or non-native perceivers, speakers often alter their speech productions using a clarified speech style, resulting in visual articulatory and acoustic changes. Such modifications may enhance speech intelligibility as perceivers make use of clear-speech cues from speaker face and voice. However, excessively exaggerated clear speech resulting in overlap of different sound categories, or attention to incorrect speech cues, may inhibit intelligibility. This research intends to investigate the role of clear speech in communicating pitch-related information: lexical tone. The objectives are to identify how speakers modify their tone production while still maintaining tone category distinctions, and how perceivers utilize tonal enhancement and categorical cues from different forms of input in challenging listening conditions. These questions will be addressed in a series of inter-related studies examining articulation, acoustics, intelligibility, and neuro-processing of clear-speech tones. Audio-video recordings will be made with native Mandarin Chinese speakers producing Mandarin tones in clear and conversational speech. Videos of speakers' facial articulatory movements in clear and conversational tone productions will be examined using innovative computer image processing techniques. Acoustic correlates of tone productions will be analyzed through computerized acoustic measurements. Auditory-visual intelligibility data will be collected in perceptually challenging conditions: cafeteria background noise and a non-native language setting. Neural processing of clear-speech tones will be examined through electro-physiological studies. Finally, articulatory, acoustic, perceptual, and neural data will be related in statistical models to determine which articulatory and acoustic clear-speech cues contribute to enhanced intelligibility and neural sensitivity of lexical tones. This research has significant implications for the fields of speech science, communication, neuroscience, computer speech technology and speech engineering. Findings of how perceivers balance tonal enhancement cues and categorical tone distinctions provide insight into how the interaction of sensory-motor and cognitive processing is orchestrated by both lower- and higher-level brain mechanisms. On a practical front, this research will inform how speech enhancement principles can be effectively applied in the development of speech technologies in different communicative contexts, e.g., speech learning and teaching, speech therapy, and human-computer interface.