A multivariat,e-state HMM an HMM with a vector state variable can be used to find jointly optimal phonetic and formant transcriptions of an utterance. The complexity of searching a multivariate state space using the BaumWelch algorithm is substantial, but may be significantly reduced if the formant frequencies are assumed to be conditionally independent given knowledge of the phone. Operating w...

The objective of this paper is to critically evaluate the performance of a nonstationary analysis method in tracking speech formant frequencies as they change with time due to the natural variations in the vocal-tract system during speech production. The method of instantaneous frequency estimation is applied to the tracking of speech formant frequencies to observe the time variations in the vo...

Spectra of vowels sung a t identical pitches by two tenor voices and two alto voices a r e compared. The formant frequencies and the source spectra a r e studied by matching the spectra on a terminal analogue of the vocal tract. As regards the source spectrum the alto voices show a higher relative amplitude of the fundamental than the tenor voices. As regards the formants, ari apparent differen...

Underlying auditory processes in speech perception were explored. Specifically of interest were the stages of auditory processing involved in the integration of dynamic information in nontraditional speech cues such as the virtual formant transitions. These signals utilize intensity ratio cues and changes in spectral center-of-gravity (instead of the actual formant frequency transitions) to pro...

This paper introduces a model being developed for estimating child and adolescent formant frequency values from adult data. The model approximates adult male and female pharyngeal and oral cavity lengths, and scales these along the corresponding male or female growth curve. The second and third formant frequencies are estimated directly from these scaled vocal tract dimensions. Two methods of e...

This article presents two experiments dealing with a psychoacoustical evaluation of the pitch-synchronous overlap-and-add (PSOLA) technique. This technique has been developed for modification of duration and fundamental frequency of speech and is based on simple waveform manipulations. Both experiments were aimed at deriving the sensitivity of the auditory system to the basic distortions introd...

The effects of mild-to-moderate hearing impairment on the perceptual importance of three acoustic correlates of stop consonant place of articulation were examined. Normal-hearing and hearing-impaired adults identified a stimulus set comprising all possible combinations of the levels of three factors: formant transition type (three levels), spectral tilt type (three levels), and abruptness of fr...

Changes in magnitude and variability of duration, fundamental frequency, formant frequencies, and spectral envelope of children's speech are investigated as a function of age and gender using data obtained from 436 children, ages 5 to 17 years, and 56 adults. The results confirm that the reduction in magnitude and within-subject variability of both temporal and spectral acoustic parameters with...

The current study explores the variations of formant frequency English vowels produced by eighty students BS and language at NUML International Islamic University Islamabad. research defines acoustic monophthongal under influence gender four standard regional varieties Pakistan presents a macro-level description Monophthongs Pakistani English. respondents belong to Balochi, Pushto, Punjabi, Sin...

Formant transitions are critical for identifying the place of articulation for consonants. If these transitions are masked by background noise, perceptual confusions can occur. To better understand the masking of formant transitions, masking thresholds were measured for tone glides and single-formant trajectories of varying frequency extent (0-3 ERBs), duration (10, 30 and 100 ms), and center f...