The effect of pitch auditory feedback perturbations on the production of anticipatory phrasal prominence and boundary

Allison Hilger, Jennifer Cole, Jason H. Kim, Rosemary A. Lester-Smith, Charles Larson*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

5 Scopus citations

Abstract

Purpose: In this study, we investigated how the direction and timing of a perturbation in voice pitch auditory feedback during phrasal production modulated the magnitude and latency of the pitch-shift reflex as well as the scaling of acoustic production of anticipatory intonation targets for phrasal prominence and boundary. Method: Brief pitch auditory feedback perturbations (±200 cents for 200-ms duration) were applied during the production of a target phrase on the first or the second word of the phrase. To replicate previous work, we first measured the magnitude and latency of the pitch-shift reflex as a function of the direction and timing of the perturbation within the phrase. As a novel approach, we also measured the adjustment in the production of the phrase-final prominent word as a function of perturbation direction and timing by extracting the acoustic correlates of pitch, loudness, and duration. Results: The pitch-shift reflex was greater in magnitude after perturbations on the first word of the phrase, replicating the results from Mandarin speakers in an American English–speaking population. Additionally, the production of the phrase-final prominent word was acoustically enhanced (lengthened vowel duration and increased intensity and fundamental frequency) after perturbations earlier in the phrase, but more so after perturbations on the first word in the phrase. Conclusion: The timing of the pitch perturbation within the phrase modulated both the magnitudeofthepitchshift reflex and the production of the prominent word, supporting our hypothesis that speakers use auditory feedback to correct for immediate production errors and to scale anticipatory intonation targets during phrasal production.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)2185-2201
Number of pages17
JournalJournal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research
Volume63
Issue number7
DOIs
StatePublished - Jul 2020

Funding

This research was funded by departmental funds from the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders at North-western University. We would like to acknowledge Chun Liang Chan for his expertise and assistance with the experiment setup and software development and support. We would also like to thank Munirah Alkhuwaiter for her assistance with defining the analysis window for the reflexive response. Additionally, we would like to thank Timo Roettger for providing consultation on performing the Bayesian analyses in R.

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Language and Linguistics
  • Linguistics and Language
  • Speech and Hearing

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