Natural versus concatenative speech in high-variability phonetic training: A pilot

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2019-01-01
Authors
Mitchell, Gabi
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Honors Projects and Posters
University Honors Program

The Honors project is potentially the most valuable component of an Honors education. Typically Honors students choose to do their projects in their area of study, but some will pick a topic of interest unrelated to their major.

The Honors Program requires that the project be presented at a poster presentation event. Poster presentations are held each semester. Most students present during their senior year, but may do so earlier if their honors project has been completed.

This site presents project descriptions and selected posters for Honors projects completed since the Fall 2015 semester.

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English
Abstract

In the quest to develop effective speech perception training, research has increasingly reported positive results with high-variability phonetic training (HVPT). Presenting utterances in different phonetic environments and by multiple speakers, HVPT provides a more representative input to map onto developing L2 sound systems. While there is much success surrounding HVPT, we still do not yet know what components of HVPT help second language learners. One characteristic that plays a major role in HVPT is the speech input, such as using “natural,” human voices versus synthetic voices. This study aimed to explore possible effects on segmental perception through high-variability training with either human voices or concatenative synthetic voices. Six non-native English-speaking participants trained with the /i/ - /ɪ/ contrast in one of the conditions. The study followed a pretest-posttest design and included one training session in between. The learning management system Canvas was used to display all materials. While this study highlighted the need to examine HVPT, it did not find conclusive results. Further studies will be needed to explore HVPT and how to maximize its gains.

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