We propose a semi-automatic method to regenerate simplified vocal tract geometries from very detailed input (e.g. MRI-based geometry) with the possibility to control the level of detail, while maintaining the overall properties. The simplification procedure controls the number and organization of the vertices in the vocal tract surface mesh and can be assigned to replace complex cross-sections ...

In both humans and songbirds, infants learn vocalizations by imitating the sounds of adult tutors with whom they interact during an early sensitive period. Vocal learning occurs in few animal taxa; similarities in the imitation process between humans and songbirds make the songbird a unique system in which vocal learning mechanisms can be studied at the neurobiological level. One theory of voca...

The vocal behavior of infants changes dramatically during early life. Whether or not such a change results from the growth of the body during development-as opposed to solely neural changes-has rarely been investigated. In this study of vocal development in marmoset monkeys, we tested the putative causal relationship between bodily growth and vocal development. During the first two months of li...

Many animals produce louder, longer or more repetitious vocalizations to compensate for increases in environmental noise. Biological costs of increased vocal effort in response to noise, including energetic costs, remain empirically undefined in many taxa, particularly in marine mammals that rely on sound for fundamental biological functions in increasingly noisy habitats. For this investigatio...

This paper reports on a behavioral study that explores the role of culture and gender in the recognition of emotional speech in an under investigated cultural context (a collectivist society: i.e., Iran). Participants were asked to recognize the emotional prosody of a set of validated emotional vocal portrayals (including the five basic emotions). Findings of the experiment were then comp...

The goal of this investigation was to test a new methodology for measuring amplitude modulation (AM) at the level of the vocal folds during vibrato in trained singers, because previous research has suggested that AM arises in large part as an acoustic epiphenomenon through an interaction of the harmonics in the laryngeal source with the resonances of the vocal tract as the fundamental frequency...

OBJECTIVES/HYPOTHESIS The diagnosis of paresis in patients with vocal fold motion impairment remains a challenge. More than 27 clinical parameters have been cited that may signify paresis. We hypothesize that some features are more significant than others. STUDY DESIGN Prospective case series. METHODS Two laryngologists rated laryngoscopy findings in 19 patients suspected of paresis. The di...

To better understand the role of each of the laryngeal muscles in producing vocal fold movement, activation of these muscles was correlated with laryngeal movement during different tasks such as sniff, cough or throat clear, and speech syllable production. Four muscles [the posterior cricoarytenoid, lateral cricoarytenoid, cricothyroid (CT), and thyroarytenoid (TA)] were recorded with bipolar h...

The present series of experiments used factorial designs to evaluate which acoustic features are primarily responsible for the voicing distinction in the syllables Izil and Isi/. Increases in frication duration tend to make the syllable more voiceless only if vocal cord vibration is absent or at a very low level during the frication period. Increasing the period between the onset of frication a...