Earl Kent Brown
Biographic Data
| ID | 387956 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Earl Kent Brown |
| GIVEN NAMES | Earl Kent |
| FAMILY NAME | Brown |
| SIGNATURE | BROWN E K |
| AFFILIATIONS | Brigham Young University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-1121-4931 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 15 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 28 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 15 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1957 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Predicting lexico-grammatical competence in L2 Spanish writing through multiple lexical diversity measures
The present study compares several lexical diversity (LD) measures to determine which measure, or measures, best predict receptive lexico-grammatical ability in written L2 Spanish, and whether a composite LD score is better than any single measure. We analyzed 1,225 written responses with eight different LD measures: six popular measures, a composite score based on Principal Component Analysis (PCA) of those six measures, and the traditional TTR …
Testing the effect of speech separation on vowel formant estimates
While recent advances in sociophonetic data processing have made it possible to analyze large datasets and audio not originally intended for linguistic analysis, overlapping speech in recordings with multiple speakers continues to be an issue that results in lost data. We evaluate whether current source separation models produce audio that is clean enough to produce reliable measurements for sociophonetic analysis. We compare formant estimates fr…
Lexical Complexity in US Statutes
Statutory language in English is difficult for the average person to understand. Although the plain language movement has gained momentum, the US federal government has been slow to change guidelines for writing statutes, resulting in linguistically complex language. This complexity is potentially problematic if residents cannot understand the laws by which they are bound. The present study aims to evaluate the lexical complexity of federal statu…
The role of constructions in understanding predictability measures and their correspondence to word duration
Studies of word predictability in context show that words in English tend to be shorter if they are predictable from the next word, and to a lesser extent, if they are predictable from the previous word. Some studies distinguish function and content words, but otherwise have not considered grammatical factors, treating all two-word sequences as comparable. Because function words are highly frequent, words occurring with them have low predictabili…
Cumulative exposure to fast speech conditions duration of content words in English
This paper tests the idea that the speech rate with which surrounding words are spoken affects the mental representation of words and conditions production of words. This possibility is operationalized by measuring a word's ratio of occurrence in speaker-relative fast speech. Other variables shown in the literature to influence speech rate are controlled for in a 10,000-iteration bootstrapping procedure of a mixed-effect linear regression model. …
The phonetics of sociophonetics: Validating acoustic approaches to Spanish /s
Second Language Acquisition of /S/-Weakening in a Study Abroad Context
This study examines the second language (L2) development of variable /s/-weakening in the spontaneous speech of L2 learners of Spanish who studied abroad in either Dominican Republic, where /s/-weakening is widespread, or central Spain, where /s/-weakening is much less common. Learners’ realizations of /s/ were coded impressionistically and acoustically by measuring voicing, center of gravity, and duration. The results show that regardless of the…
A production and perception study of /t/ glottalization and oral releases following glottals in the US
The articulation of /t/ in American English varies according to linguistic and extralinguistic factors. Concerning social factors, word-final /t/ glottalization is seen more among speakers of African American English (Farrington 2018), younger speakers (Partin-Hernandez 2005, Roberts 2006), and women (Byrd 1994, Eddington and Channer 2010). This paper examines the production and perception of /t/ in five US states: Indiana, Mississippi, New Mexic…
The Effect of Forms' Ratio of Conditioning on Word-Final /s/ Voicing in Mexican Spanish
There is mounting evidence that words that occur proportionately more often in contexts that condition a phonetically-motivated sound change end up changing more rapidly than other words. Support has been found in at least modern-day Spanish, Medieval Spanish, bilingual English-Spanish, and modern-day English. This study tests whether there is support for this idea with regards to the variable voicing of word-final /s/ in Spanish. An analysis of …
Constructing two phonological systems: A phonetic analysis of /p/, /t/, /k/ among early Spanish–English bilingual speakers
Aims and objectives/purpose/research questions: Many early Spanish-English bilingual speakers in the USA learn Spanish as their first language at home and English in school. This paper seeks to elucidate whether these speakers develop a separate phonological system for English and, if so, the role of primary and secondary cues in the development of the second language (L2) system. Design/methodology/approach: The phonetic realization of the voice…
The role of contextual frequency in the articulation of initial /f/ in Modern Spanish: The same effect as in the reduction of Latin /f
The acoustic energy of 996 tokens of word-initial /f/ in the speech of 38 speakers of Mexican Spanish was analyzed. The results suggest that the frequency with which words occur in phonological contexts favorable to reduction (Frequency in a Reducing Context or FRC) conditions the reduction of /f/, even after taking into account the immediate phonological context. Despite this, it is also found that the conditioning effect of FRC is less robust t…
The gradient nature of s -lenition in Caleño Spanish
Whereas previous studies of Spanish s -weakening have relied on impressionistic coding, the present study examines temporal and gradient acoustic details in the production of /s/ by eight females from Cali, Colombia, during sociolinguistic interviews. We propose a metric for quantifying s -realization by employing three scalar-dependent variables: s -duration, centroid, and voicelessness. The results of linear regressions indicate that the depend…
A Usage-Based Account of Syllable- and Word-Final /s/ Reduction in Four Dialects of Spanish
Article A Usage-Based Account of Syllable- and Word-Final /s/ Reduction in Four Dialects of Spanish was published on March 1, 2009 in the journal Studies in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics (volume 2, issue 1)
Religion in America
Richard Baxter's Contribution to the Comprehension Controversy: A Study in Projected Church Union
Thesis (Ph. D.)--Boston University \nIncludes abstract and vita. \nIncludes bibliographical references (leaves 307-325). \nMicrofilm. \ns
The gradient nature of s -lenition in Caleño Spanish
Whereas previous studies of Spanish s -weakening have relied on impressionistic coding, the present study examines temporal and gradient acoustic details in the production of /s/ by eight females from Cali, Colombia, during sociolinguistic interviews. We propose a metric for quantifying s -realization by employing three scalar-dependent variables: s -duration, centroid, and voicelessness. The results of linear regressions indicate that the depend…
The Effect of Forms' Ratio of Conditioning on Word-Final /s/ Voicing in Mexican Spanish
There is mounting evidence that words that occur proportionately more often in contexts that condition a phonetically-motivated sound change end up changing more rapidly than other words. Support has been found in at least modern-day Spanish, Medieval Spanish, bilingual English-Spanish, and modern-day English. This study tests whether there is support for this idea with regards to the variable voicing of word-final /s/ in Spanish. An analysis of …
The role of contextual frequency in the articulation of initial /f/ in Modern Spanish: The same effect as in the reduction of Latin /f
The acoustic energy of 996 tokens of word-initial /f/ in the speech of 38 speakers of Mexican Spanish was analyzed. The results suggest that the frequency with which words occur in phonological contexts favorable to reduction (Frequency in a Reducing Context or FRC) conditions the reduction of /f/, even after taking into account the immediate phonological context. Despite this, it is also found that the conditioning effect of FRC is less robust t…
The role of constructions in understanding predictability measures and their correspondence to word duration
Studies of word predictability in context show that words in English tend to be shorter if they are predictable from the next word, and to a lesser extent, if they are predictable from the previous word. Some studies distinguish function and content words, but otherwise have not considered grammatical factors, treating all two-word sequences as comparable. Because function words are highly frequent, words occurring with them have low predictabili…
Cumulative exposure to fast speech conditions duration of content words in English
This paper tests the idea that the speech rate with which surrounding words are spoken affects the mental representation of words and conditions production of words. This possibility is operationalized by measuring a word's ratio of occurrence in speaker-relative fast speech. Other variables shown in the literature to influence speech rate are controlled for in a 10,000-iteration bootstrapping procedure of a mixed-effect linear regression model. …
Richard Baxter's Contribution to the Comprehension Controversy: A Study in Projected Church Union
Thesis (Ph. D.)--Boston University \nIncludes abstract and vita. \nIncludes bibliographical references (leaves 307-325). \nMicrofilm. \ns
Religion in America
A Usage-Based Account of Syllable- and Word-Final /s/ Reduction in Four Dialects of Spanish
Article A Usage-Based Account of Syllable- and Word-Final /s/ Reduction in Four Dialects of Spanish was published on March 1, 2009 in the journal Studies in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics (volume 2, issue 1)
The gradient nature of s -lenition in Caleño Spanish
Whereas previous studies of Spanish s -weakening have relied on impressionistic coding, the present study examines temporal and gradient acoustic details in the production of /s/ by eight females from Cali, Colombia, during sociolinguistic interviews. We propose a metric for quantifying s -realization by employing three scalar-dependent variables: s -duration, centroid, and voicelessness. The results of linear regressions indicate that the depend…
The role of contextual frequency in the articulation of initial /f/ in Modern Spanish: The same effect as in the reduction of Latin /f
The acoustic energy of 996 tokens of word-initial /f/ in the speech of 38 speakers of Mexican Spanish was analyzed. The results suggest that the frequency with which words occur in phonological contexts favorable to reduction (Frequency in a Reducing Context or FRC) conditions the reduction of /f/, even after taking into account the immediate phonological context. Despite this, it is also found that the conditioning effect of FRC is less robust t…
Constructing two phonological systems: A phonetic analysis of /p/, /t/, /k/ among early Spanish–English bilingual speakers
Aims and objectives/purpose/research questions: Many early Spanish-English bilingual speakers in the USA learn Spanish as their first language at home and English in school. This paper seeks to elucidate whether these speakers develop a separate phonological system for English and, if so, the role of primary and secondary cues in the development of the second language (L2) system. Design/methodology/approach: The phonetic realization of the voice…
A production and perception study of /t/ glottalization and oral releases following glottals in the US
The articulation of /t/ in American English varies according to linguistic and extralinguistic factors. Concerning social factors, word-final /t/ glottalization is seen more among speakers of African American English (Farrington 2018), younger speakers (Partin-Hernandez 2005, Roberts 2006), and women (Byrd 1994, Eddington and Channer 2010). This paper examines the production and perception of /t/ in five US states: Indiana, Mississippi, New Mexic…
The Effect of Forms' Ratio of Conditioning on Word-Final /s/ Voicing in Mexican Spanish
There is mounting evidence that words that occur proportionately more often in contexts that condition a phonetically-motivated sound change end up changing more rapidly than other words. Support has been found in at least modern-day Spanish, Medieval Spanish, bilingual English-Spanish, and modern-day English. This study tests whether there is support for this idea with regards to the variable voicing of word-final /s/ in Spanish. An analysis of …
Second Language Acquisition of /S/-Weakening in a Study Abroad Context
This study examines the second language (L2) development of variable /s/-weakening in the spontaneous speech of L2 learners of Spanish who studied abroad in either Dominican Republic, where /s/-weakening is widespread, or central Spain, where /s/-weakening is much less common. Learners’ realizations of /s/ were coded impressionistically and acoustically by measuring voicing, center of gravity, and duration. The results show that regardless of the…
The phonetics of sociophonetics: Validating acoustic approaches to Spanish /s
Cumulative exposure to fast speech conditions duration of content words in English
This paper tests the idea that the speech rate with which surrounding words are spoken affects the mental representation of words and conditions production of words. This possibility is operationalized by measuring a word's ratio of occurrence in speaker-relative fast speech. Other variables shown in the literature to influence speech rate are controlled for in a 10,000-iteration bootstrapping procedure of a mixed-effect linear regression model. …
The role of constructions in understanding predictability measures and their correspondence to word duration
Studies of word predictability in context show that words in English tend to be shorter if they are predictable from the next word, and to a lesser extent, if they are predictable from the previous word. Some studies distinguish function and content words, but otherwise have not considered grammatical factors, treating all two-word sequences as comparable. Because function words are highly frequent, words occurring with them have low predictabili…
Testing the effect of speech separation on vowel formant estimates
While recent advances in sociophonetic data processing have made it possible to analyze large datasets and audio not originally intended for linguistic analysis, overlapping speech in recordings with multiple speakers continues to be an issue that results in lost data. We evaluate whether current source separation models produce audio that is clean enough to produce reliable measurements for sociophonetic analysis. We compare formant estimates fr…
Lexical Complexity in US Statutes
Statutory language in English is difficult for the average person to understand. Although the plain language movement has gained momentum, the US federal government has been slow to change guidelines for writing statutes, resulting in linguistically complex language. This complexity is potentially problematic if residents cannot understand the laws by which they are bound. The present study aims to evaluate the lexical complexity of federal statu…
Predicting lexico-grammatical competence in L2 Spanish writing through multiple lexical diversity measures
The present study compares several lexical diversity (LD) measures to determine which measure, or measures, best predict receptive lexico-grammatical ability in written L2 Spanish, and whether a composite LD score is better than any single measure. We analyzed 1,225 written responses with eight different LD measures: six popular measures, a composite score based on Principal Component Analysis (PCA) of those six measures, and the traditional TTR …
Linguistics (11 works) · Phonetics and Phonology Research (11 works) · Linguistic Variation and Morphology (9 works) · Mathematics (8 works) · Psychology (7 works) · Computer Science (6 works) · History (6 works) · Philosophy (6 works) · Context (archaeology (5 works) · History (4 works)