Doctoral Dissertation Research: Temporal and Spatial Properties of Speech at the Intersection of Production and Perception

这个项目将解决关于产生和感知语言之间联系的本质的基本问题。现有的实验证据表明，语音产生系统在语音感知过程中有自动和非自愿的激活。这个项目的一个目标是研究语言的哪些属性在感知-产生环节中是重要的，这个问题还没有被系统地解决。语言的产生涉及到空间特性，即哪些发音者在声道的哪个位置收缩，以及时间特性，即这些收缩在时间上是如何相互排列的。我们将进行一系列的线索-干扰实验，以阐明语音中感知-产生相互作用发生的条件。这种相互作用将通过测量参与者对产生的音节（提示）的反应时间来检测，而另一个音节被感知（干扰）。当线索和干扰物具有相同的空间特征（例如，“pa”和“ba”，它们都涉及上下唇闭合）或时间特征（例如，“ba”和“da”，它们都涉及口腔闭合和元音发声之间的相似时间）时，受试者的反应时间将进行比较。通过分析这些任务中的反应时间，我们将知道由感知到的干扰物引起的非自愿激活是否以及如何与对视觉线索的预期反应相结合。该项目的第二个目标是开发一个正式的感知-生产联系的计算模型，以解释和统一这一联系的现有和新的证据。行动和感知在行为上是紧密相连的。本研究调查了言语中行为和感知之间联系的一个具体实例，从而加深了我们对人类交流机制的理解。该项目将在涉及反应时间数据的特定实验范式中提供语音感知和产生之间联系的明确计算模型。尽管多年来一直在研究生产-感知联系这一主题，但还没有形成这样一个模型。这个模型将对该领域有价值，因为它将有助于改进进一步的预测，从而设计新的实验，以提高我们对语音中感知-运动相互作用的理解。更好地理解感知和生产之间的关系可能会揭示一个领域的障碍可能与另一个领域的障碍相关的方式。例如，患有非流利性失语症的个体在言语产生方面有困难，但通常在言语感知方面没有困难，并且他们已经被证明通过多感官言语感知训练可以改善某些生产任务。因此，这项研究对于揭示新治疗方法的临床相关机制具有潜在的长期益处。此外，本项目中用于收集和分析响应时间数据的方法以及计算建模组件将在现有的培训框架中添加新的重要组件，向本科生介绍理论和实验语言学的综合方法。

This project will address fundamental questions about the nature of the link between producing and perceiving speech. Existing experimental evidence points to the automatic and involuntary activation of the speech production system during speech perception. One goal of this project is to investigate what properties of speech are important in the perception-production link, a question that has not been systematically addressed. Speech production involves spatial properties, which speech articulators make what constrictions where in the vocal tract, and temporal properties, how those constrictions are arranged relative to one another in time. A series of cue-distractor experiments will be conducted to elucidate the conditions under which perception-production interactions occur in speech. Such interactions will be detected by measuring participants' reaction times to syllables produced (the cue) while another syllable is being perceived (the distractor). Subjects' reaction times will be compared in cases where the cue and distractor share spatial properties (for example, "pa" and "ba", which both involve a closing of the upper and lower lips) or temporal properties (for example, "ba" and "da", which both involve similar timing between the oral closure and vowel voicing). By analyzing the reaction times in such tasks, we will know if and how the involuntary activation resulting from the perceived distractor combines with the intended response to the visual cue. A second goal of the project is to develop a formal computational model of the perception-production link to account for and unify existing and new evidence for this link.Action and perception are known to be closely linked in behavior. This study investigates a specific instance of the link between action and perception in speech, thereby sharpening our understanding of the mechanisms underlying human communication. The project will provide an explicit computational model of the link between speech perception and production in specific experimental paradigms involving reaction time data. Such a model has not been developed despite many years of work on the topic of production-perception links. This model will be of value to the field because it will help to refine further predictions, and thus to design new experiments for sharpening our understanding of perceptuo-motor interactions in speech. A better understanding of the relation between perception and production may shed light on the ways in which disorders of one domain may be related to the disorders of the other. For example, individuals with non-fluent aphasia have difficulty with speech production but generally not with speech perception, and they have been shown to improve on certain production tasks through multi-sensory speech perception training. This research therefore has potential long-term benefits for revealing clinically relevant insights into the mechanisms of new treatment approaches. In addition, the methods used to collect and analyze response time data along with the computational modeling component in this project will add new important components in an existing training framework introducing undergraduates to integrative methods in theoretical and experimental linguistics.