Acoustic analysis was conducted to investigate symptomatic differences in decreased oral alternating motion rates (AMRs) between individuals with spastic and with ataxic dysarthria. The subjects were 6 individuals with spastic dysarthria, 6 with ataxic dysarthria and 6 normal speakers. Monosyllables /pa/ and /ta/ were used to examine alternating motions of the lips and tongue, respectively. In the decreased AMRs of the spastic group, the mean syllable durations were generally longer in the individuals where the mean total syllable durations were longer, and in the decreased AMRs of the ataxic group, the mean gap durations were generally longer in the individuals where the mean total syllable durations were longer. It was suggested that each syllable component could represent a separate function and contribute differently to the decreased AMRs in these dysarthric groups.
Masaharu MARUISHI 2) and Hiroyuki MURANAKA 2)2) Hiroshima Prefectural Rehabilitation Center, JapanTo clarify how the brain understands the speaker's mind for verbal acts, we analyzed fMRI images obtained from 24 subjects when they judged linguistic meanings or emotional manners of spoken phrases. The target phrases had linguistically positive or negative meanings and were uttered warmheartedly or coldheartedly by a woman speaker. Significant interaction effects of meaning and manner were observed on the acoustic characteristics of utterances, such as F0 range, and also on the perceptual behavior evaluated by response time and judgment correctness. When compared to the female subjects, the male subjects showed significantly stronger activation only in the right frontomedian cortex, which can be hypothesized to analyze and understand speaker's hidden but true intentions from speaking acts. These results suggest that emotion modulates linguistic processes not only in speech production but also in speech perception, and such modulations differ between the genders at least in perceptual processes.
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