The overlooked effect of amplitude on within-speaker vowel variation

Dados Bibliográficos

ID21226767
AutoresJoseph William Black (0000-0002-8272-5763, University of Canterbury, autor correspondente), J Hay (0000-0001-8127-0413, University of Canterbury), Lynn Clark (0000-0003-3282-6555, University of Canterbury), James Brand (0000-0002-2853-9169, Charles University)
Ano2024
Volume9
Fascículo1
Páginas173-189
Data de publicação2024-01-02
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoLinguistics Vanguard (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 2199-174X • E-ISSN: 2199-174X
EditoraWalter de Gruyter GmbH (PUBLISHER • DE)
DOI10.1515/lingvan-2022-0086
OpenAlexW4388972969
IdiomaEN
Referências citadas44

We analyse variation in vowel production within monologues produced by speakers in a quiet, well-controlled environment. Using principal component analysis (PCA) and generalized additive mixed models (GAMMs), applied to a large corpus of naturalistic recordings of New Zealand English speakers, we show that the first formant of monophthongs varies significantly with variation in a speaker’s relative amplitude. We also find that amplitude variation is used, potentially agentively, to mark the beginning and ending of topical sections within single-speaker monologues. These results have significant methodological consequences for the study of vocalic variation in the context of research on speaker style and language variation and change. While laboratory research has shown a connection between variation in F1 and amplitude in loud environments or with distant interlocutors, this has not been seen in quiet environments with unscripted speech of the sort often used in sociolinguistcs. We argue that taking account of this variation is an important challenge for both within-speaker investigation of stylistic covariation and across-speaker investigation. In the latter case we recommend, as a minimal step, the inclusion of a measure of relative amplitude within regression models

Formant · Linguistics · QUIET · Speech recognition · Vowel · Computer Science · History · Linguistic Variation and Morphology · Multilingual Education and Policy · Phonetics and Phonology Research