Chapter 4: Speech Production

+ section 3.3 and 3.4 i think i mixed up some of the terms with chapter 4 but whatever

language learning in the womb

occurs especially during the 3rd trimester to birth; the foetus can hear and respond to sounds in the environment, lower frequencies carry prosody to the foetus

high-amplitude sucking (HAS) technique

an experimental procedure that measures the frequency of an infant’s sucking on a non-nutritive nipple

conditioned head turn technique

an experimental method that trains the infant to turn its head in a particular direction when it detects a change in the auditory stimulus

infant-directed speech

a manner of speaking to infants that attracts their attention and helps them learn language (universal)

prosodic bootstrapping

a hypothesis proposing that infants use intonation and stress patterns to infer phrase and word boundaries

bootstrapping

the situation in which previous knowledge and experience is used to generate second generation strategies and ideas, which themselves are used to generate a third generation etc.

metrical segmentation strategy

a rule-of-thumb both infants and adults use in segmenting the speech stream by assuming English words begin on a stressed syllable

stress

the combination of acoustic properties of falling pitch, vowel duration, and increased amplitude

transitional/statistical probability

the likelihood that a particular event will occur next given the current event

perceptual narrowing

the process of transitioning from more universal or unconstrained perceptual abilities to those that are more narrow or constrained

distributional learning

the tracking of the frequency and location of various sounds in the speech stream

lack of invariance

the observation that there is no reliable relationship between a phoneme and the acoustic signal

motor theory

a theory of speech perception that proposes people perceive speech by inferring the movements of the vocal tract that produced those sounds instead of analysing the speech stream into phonemes

nativism

the view that behaviour is mainly shaped by natural selection and thus encoded in our genes

language acquisition device

a specialised set of processing units in the brain that guides the rapid development of language in human infants (Chomsky)

module

a dedicated neural system that has evolved to perform a specific function

speech is special

the view that speech perception is a distinct cognitive module that operates independently of and differently from other perceptual systems

general auditory framework

the assumption that speech perception operates by means of the same mechanisms that have evolved in humans and other animals to perceive environmental sounds (argument against motor theory)

direct realism

the theory that we have direct awareness of the world because the sensory input is sufficiently rich for us to completely recover the object of perception

mirror neurons

a brain cell that reacts both when a particular action is performed and when it is only observed

embodied cognition

a point of view arguing that cognition is rooted in the body’s interactions with the world around it

vocal folds

a pair of membranes stretched across the opening of the glottis that can be vibrated to produce soound

alveolar ridge

the fleshy region of the mouth covering the bone where the upper teeth are anchored

hard palate

the bony region along the roof of the mouth

velum

the fleshy region behind the hard palate (also known as the soft palate)

place of articulation (POA)

the location in the oral cavity where the airflow is obstructed to produce a consonant sound

bilabial

a consonant sound produced by bringing the upper and lower lips together

labiodental

a consonant produced by bringing the lower lip against the upper teeth

interdental

a consonant produced by protruding the tongue between the upper and lower teeth

alveolar

a consonant produced by pressing the blade of the tongue against the region between the alveolar ridge and the hard palate

velar

a consonant produced by pressing the root of the tongue against the velum at the back of the mouth

glottal stop

a consonant produced by constricting the vocal folds

manner of articulation (MOA)

the degree to which airflow is obstructed in the production of consonants

plosive

a consonant produced by momentarily stopping and then releasing the airflow

voice onset time (VOT)

distinguishes between voiced (early VOT) and voiceless (late VOT) stops

nasal stops

consonants produced by blocking the airflow in the oral cavity and releasing it through the nose

affricate

a consonant produced by momentarily blocking the airflow and then releasing it through a tight constriction

fricative

a consonant produced by passing the airflow through a constriction in the oral cavity

approximant

a consonant produced by diverting airflow without constricting it (liquids)

schwa

a neutral mid-central vowel occurring in many unstressed syllables in English

diphthong

a vowel combination that is perceived as a single phoneme

cerebral cortex

thin outer covering of the brain where most of the computation responsible for conscious experience and world interactions take place

gyrus

a protruding region of the cerebral cortex

superior, medial, and inferior temporal gyri

three horizontal parallel-running gyri on the temporal lobe

location of the Wernicke’s area

located towards the back of the superior temporal gyrus

superior, medial, and inferior frontal gyri

three horizontal parallel-running gyri on the frontal lobe

location of the Broca’s area

located towards the back of the inferior frontal gyrus

sulcus

a region of the cerebral cortex that is folded inward

central sulcus

a fold with gyri on both sides of it (pre-central and post-central gyri) that separates the frontal and parietal lobes

somatosensory cortex

the region of the brain found within the post-central gyrus that processes the body senses to keep track of what the various body parts are doing, including the articulators for speech

primary motor cortex

the region of the brain found within the pre-central gyrus that programs commands to move the body, including the articulators for speech

sensorimotor cortex

a term that encompasses the somatosensory cortex and the primary motor cortex due to their close proximity

longitudinal fissure

the deep groove separating the left and right hemispheres

supplementary motor area

a brain region included in the longitudinal fissure region that is believed to be responsible for programming intentional actions (as opposed to responses to sensory input)

anterior cingulate cortex

a region deep inside the longitudinal fissure that is believed to be involved in error detection and monitoring conflict

lateral sulcus (Sylvian fissure)

the deep fold in the cerebral cortex that separates the temporal lobe from the frontal and parietal lobe (this is where the primary auditory cortex is located)

anterior insula

a region deep within the lateral sulcus that has been involved in language processing

Perisylvian cortex

the region inside of and surrounding the lateral sulcus

dysarthria

a motor speech disorder due to neural injury that is characterised by poor articulation of phonemes and prosody

basal ganglia

regulates the motor system by selecting the appropriate and inhibiting inappropriate behaviours to achieve the intended task

thalamus

a midbrain structure traditionally thought of as a sensorimotor relay from various brain structure up to the cerebral cortex

phonotation stage

the first stage of infant vocalisation, occurring from birth to 2 months when infants produce vowel-like sounds by vibrating the vocal folds

gooing stage

the second stage of infant vocalisation, occurring from 2-4 months when the infant produces syllable-like sounds in the back of the vocal tract (ex. “coo”, “goo”)

expansion stage

the third stage of infant vocalisation, occurring from 4-6 months when the infant produces a variety of different sounds after gaining control over the lips, tongue, and jaw (ex. “raspberry sounds, well-formed vowels (“ee”, “ah”) with occasional consonant-like sounds)

marginal babbling

the syllable-like sounds made of well-formed vowels and consonant-like sounds created during the expansion stage

canonical babbling

the fourth stage of infant vocalisation that occurs between 6-10 months when vocalisations become more speech-like, characterised by clearly formed consonant-vowel syllables

isolated syllables

vocalisations first produced during canonical babbling, consisting of one consonant phoneme and one vowel phoneme (ex, “ba”, “mu”, “toh”, etc.)

object-directed vocalisation

babbling uttered as the infant approached and manipulates a novel object

slow expressive development

a delay in babbling or talking in spite of developing receptive language and social interaction skills at a normal rate

childhood apraxia of speech

a condition in which children experience severe difficulty in producing speech even though their cognitive, perceptual, and motor skills are otherwise in the normal range

fis phenomenon

a condition in which a child can clearly hear a distinction between two phonemes, but uses only one of them when speaking

residual speech sound errors

misarticulations that persist into the elementary school years (ex. /l/ and /r/ replaced with /w/, /sh/ replaced with /s/, /th/ replaced with /f/)

allophone

phonemes that are physically different (i.e. different IPA symbols, and acoustics) but treated the same in a language

newborn - 5 months (language development)

• infants show us their knowledge of language and how they understand and produce language

• react to the sounds that they hear (by vocalizing, and orient their heads when someone is speaking to them)

• vocal pleasure and displeasure

• noises produced are random or goal-seeking

• cooing stage

• phonotation stage

• expansion stage

6-12 months (language development)

• infants begin to use more gestures

• canonical babbling: reduplicated and variegated

12-18 months (language development)

• infants begin to understand language (more than what they can produce), name multiple new words each day

• follow simple instructions and routines

• produce first words: first names of familiar people and objects, body parts

• some have reached a critical mass, leading to a naming explosion

18-24 months (language development)

• lexical word development

• majority of infants have reached a critical mass, leading to a naming explosion

• some production of 2-3 word utterances (closer to the end of the stage)

2 years (language development)

• increase in mean length utterance (MLU)

• speech become intelligible to others, and not just family

3-4 years (language development)

• counting: begins to mean something (more towards the 4 year side)

• sequencing

• mapping concepts together

• produce full sentences

• show you what they know (categorizing objects into groups (categorical relations between objects, which tells us how their semantic memory is organized))

• talk about more abstract things (displacement)

• try to find words that convey meaning of other words that they don’t know yet (ex. yesterday a long time ago = before yesterday/earlier in the month)

4+ years (language development)

more advances in language comprehension and production: kids produce more and more words as they age, produce more complex syntax/syntactic structures, and show interest in reading

receptive ability

the ability to understand/receive language (language competency)

expressive ability

the ability to express/use/produce words (language performance)

overgeneralisation

an error in which one overextends a label to more than what it refers to

underextension

an error that occurs when a child acquires a word for a particular thing and fails to extend it to other objects in the same category, using the word in a highly restricted and individualistic way

superordinate category

a category that is very general (ex. an animal)

subordinate category

a category that is quite specific (ex. a robin)

basic level category

a category that is in between subordinate and superordinate (ex. a type of animal; a bird)

segmentation

a problem in adult/normal speech perception where we need to figure out boundaries in speech, same thing with infant speech perception

statistical probability in language

patterns in random strings of nonword utterances

postalveolar

a consonant produced with the tongue near or touching the back of the alveolar ridge

critical mass

a size, number, or amount large enough to produce a particular result

naming explosion

a period that begins at around 18 months of age, when a child will begin to produce a significant amount (~8) of words each day

mean length of utterance (MLU)

the average number of morphemes per utterance