Talker-to-listener distance effects on the variations of the intensity and the fundamental frequency of speech

Fux, Thibaut; Feng, Gang; Zimpfer, Véronique

doi:10.1109/icassp.2011.5947470

Cited by 5 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 4 publications

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“…With regard to tone shape, our hypothesis is that the tone shapes corresponding to farther distances will be exaggerated, with high contrast, and those corresponding to close distances will be reduced, with low contrast . The acoustic landmarks representing tones at farther TLDs include high f0, delayed targets and steeper slopes (Fux et al, 2011;Xu & Wang, 2001;Xu, Xu, & Luo, 1999). 3.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Effects of talker-to-listener distance on tone

Shih

2015

Journal of Phonetics

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A B S T R A C TThis paper explores the effects of talker-to-listener distance (TLD) on tone and examines its impact on tone perception by both native listeners and second language learners.Speakers naturally adjust vocal effort to talk to people at different distances, which leads to changes not only in intensity, duration and formant frequencies, but also in fundamental frequency (f0). Fundamental frequency is the primary acoustic cue that differentiates Mandarin lexical tones from one another. This study aims to answer the question of whether changes in f0 as a function of TLD affect tone perception by native (L1) and second language (L2) listeners. If so, what are the specific changes that have an impact on tone perception?The production study investigates the acoustic correlates of the effects of TLD on tone, using 7959 monosyllabic Mandarin speech files recorded by three speakers under 11 levels of TLD. The perception study explores the effects of TLD on L1 and L2 tone perception by 2 native listeners and 52 L2 listeners.The effects of TLD on speech production are systematic, and we present models and analyses with sufficient detail to simulate these effects. Intensity, duration, and initial and maximum f0 increase along with TLD, while time-normalized toneshapes remain invariant. The results of the perception study show that native listeners' performance is robust under changes in TLD, while L2 listeners' perception of tone interacts with TLD. One significant finding is that tone 3 recognition improves with TLD.This work investigates the relationship between speech production and perception when acoustic attributes change naturally in response to the demands of speech communication. The results have potential applications in speech synthesis, pronunciation training and second language testing.Published by Elsevier Ltd.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Effects of talker-to-listener distance on tone

Shih

2015

Journal of Phonetics

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“…As distance increases so does the vocal effort. In fact, Brungart et al report that as distance doubles the intensity increases by 8 dB, while Liénard et al report that F0 increases at 3.5 Hz/dB (Fux et al, 2011) (Liénard and Di Benedetto, 1999). Distance, however, is not the only time we adjust our vocal effort.…”

Section: Vocal Effort Codingmentioning

confidence: 95%

“…Liénard and Di Benedetto (1999), however, also claim an increase in the second formant, F2, for females but this has not yet been widely accepted. Shouted sentences have increased initial F0 slope but a decreased final F0 (Fux et al, 2011) and a decreased spectral slope (Zhang and Hansen, 2007). They are longer in duration which is caused by longer word duration, but have a decreased silence duration (Zhang and Hansen, 2007).…”

Section: Vocal Effort Codingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Integration of a distance sensitive wireless communication protocol to hearing protectors equipped with in-ear microphones

Serhal

Falk

Voix

2013

The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America

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Using radio communication in noisy environments is a practical and affordable solution allowing communication between workers wearing Hearing Protection Devices (HPD). However, typical radio communication systems have two main limitations when used in noisy environments: first, the background noise is disturbing the voice signal picked-up and transmitted, and second, that voice signal goes to all listeners on the same radio channel regardless of their physical proximity. A new concept of a so-called " Radio Acoustical Virtual Environment" (RAVE) addressing these two issues is presented. Using an intra-aural instantly custom molded HPD equipped with both an inear microphone and miniature loudspeaker, undisturbed speech is captured from inside the ear canal and transmitted over the wireless radio to the remote listener. The transmitted signal will only be received by listeners within a given spatial range, such range depending on the user's vocal effort and background noise level. This paper demonstrates the technological challenges to overcome and the methodology involved in the implementation of RAVE.

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“…We, however, refrained from replicating such a setting because of the known effects of talker-to-listener distance (henceforth TLD) on the variation of speech acoustics. It has been repeatedly shown that talkers spontaneously adjust their way of speaking in response to the increasing distance from the listeners, with consequences on various acoustic parameters, such as duration, intensity, fundamental frequency (f0) and formant frequencies (see a.o., Cheyne et al, 2009 ; Fux et al, 2011 ; Pelegrín-García et al, 2011 ). In this design, it would be hard to disentangle acoustic variations due to TLD and those to individualization or cooperation.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Speakers are more cooperative and less individual when interacting in larger group sizes

Pellegrino

Dellwo

2023

Front. Psychol.

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IntroductionCooperation, acoustically signaled through vocal convergence, is facilitated when group members are more similar. Excessive vocal convergence may, however, weaken individual recognizability. This study aimed to explore whether constraints to convergence can arise in circumstances where interlocutors need to enhance their vocal individuality. Therefore, we tested the effects of group size (3 and 5 interactants) on vocal convergence and individualization in a social communication scenario in which individual recognition by voice is at stake.MethodsIn an interactive game, players had to recognize each other through their voices while solving a cooperative task online. The vocal similarity was quantified through similarities in speaker i-vectors obtained through probabilistic linear discriminant analysis (PLDA). Speaker recognition performance was measured through the system Equal Error Rate (EER).ResultsVocal similarity between-speakers increased with a larger group size which indicates a higher cooperative vocal behavior. At the same time, there was an increase in EER for the same speakers between the smaller and the larger group size, meaning a decrease in overall recognition performance.DiscussionThe decrease in vocal individualization in the larger group size suggests that ingroup cooperation and social cohesion conveyed through acoustic convergence have priority over individualization in larger groups of unacquainted speakers.

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Talker-to-listener distance effects on the variations of the intensity and the fundamental frequency of speech

Cited by 5 publications

References 4 publications

Effects of talker-to-listener distance on tone

Effects of talker-to-listener distance on tone

Integration of a distance sensitive wireless communication protocol to hearing protectors equipped with in-ear microphones

Speakers are more cooperative and less individual when interacting in larger group sizes

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