Academic literature on the topic '[ʃ]'

AbstractWe present tongue-palate contact (EPG) and acoustic data on English sibilant assimilation, with a particular focus on the asymmetry arising from the order of the sibilants. It is generally known that /s#ʃ/ sequences may display varying degrees of regressive assimilation in fluent speech, yet for /ʃ#s/ it is widely assumed that no assimilation takes place, although the empirical content of this assumption has rarely been investigated nor a clear theoretical explanation proposed. We systematically compare the two sibilant orders in word-boundary clusters. Our data show that /s#ʃ/ sequences assimilate frequently and this assimilation is strictly regressive. The assimilated sequence may be indistinguishable from a homorganic control sequence by our measures, or it can be characterized by measurement values intermediate to those typical for /ʃ/ or /s/. /ʃ#s/ sequences may also show regressive assimilation, albeit less frequently and to a lesser degree. Assimilated /ʃ#s/ sequences are always distinguishable from /s#s/ sequences. In a few cases, we identify progressive assimilation for /ʃ#s/. We discuss how to account for the differences in degree of assimilation, and we propose that the order asymmetry may arise from the different articulatory control structures employed for the two sibilants in conjunction with phonotactic probability effects.

We present findings of an investigation into the acquisition of the English /s/–/ʃ/ contrast by native speakers of Korean and Japanese. Both of these languages have the phones [s] and [ʃ], and both languages exhibit a pattern—or motivate a rule—whereby /s/ is realized as [ʃ] before the vowel [i] and the glide [j]—that is, high front vocoids. The crucial difference, and the focus of this study, is that in Korean [s] and [ʃ] are allophones of /s/, whereas in Japanese the two sounds arguably instantiate different phonemes. We present production data showing that the differences in the functioning of [s] and [ʃ] in the second language learner’s native language have different consequences for the acquisition patterns and the error types produced in the learning of this contrast.

For some speakers of English, realization of the fricative in the consonant cluster /stɹ/may be undergoing a sound change in progress. Previous reports suggest that /s/ is being realized as the postalveolar fricative [ʃ], with the approximant /ɹ/ as a possible trigger. Research in sociolinguistics also indicates that there may be various intermediate stages of the change, falling somewhere between a typical /ʃ/ and /s/. However, information about the precise phonetic characteristics of these novel variants is still sparse, and existing sociolinguistic studies have not compared speakers’ realization of /stɹ/ to their typical /s/ and /ʃ/ productions. This paper uses the acoustic measurement of spectral peak to compare ten English speakers’ productions of the onsets /ʃ/, /ʃɹ/, /stɹ/, and /s/. The findings suggest that the majority of tokens produced by these speakers fall within their normal range for /ʃ/, with only limited evidence of intermediate forms. It is proposed that spectral peak measurement seems to be a stable method for use in future research categorizing variants of /stɹ/. However, this should include comparison to subjects’ normal /ʃ/ productions.

Australian English /t/ has a fricative realisation in some contexts. The presence of an additional surface fricative in the language raises questions about potential merger and the maintenance of contrasts. An orthographic representation of fricated /t/ as 〈sh〉 suggests a similarity to the existing fricative /ʃ/. This paper compares the acoustic characteristics of fricated realisations of /t/ in Australian English with those of /ʃ/ and /s/, the fricatives judged most likely to be acoustically similar. The findings suggest a great degree of similarity to /ʃ/ in terms of spectral measures, with duration being the most likely perceptual means of distinguishing fricated /t/ from /ʃ/.

Abstract We study the intrinsic geometry of area minimizing hypersurfaces from a new point of view by relating this subject to quasiconformal geometry. Namely, for any such hypersurface H we define and construct a so-called S-structure. This new and natural concept reveals some unexpected geometric and analytic properties of H and its singularity set Ʃ. Moreover, it can be used to prove the existence of hyperbolic unfoldings of H\Ʃ. These are canonical conformal deformations of H\Ʃ into complete Gromov hyperbolic spaces of bounded geometry with Gromov boundary homeomorphic to Ʃ. These new concepts and results naturally extend to the larger class of almost minimizers.

Although studies on English sound learning by L2 Thai learners have been widely examined, there have been no studies on the production of the English /tʃ/ and /ʃ/ sounds in the initial position by L2 Thai learners with consideration of vowel contexts, the experience of L2 learners and target sounds. The aim of this study is to examine the production of the English /tʃ/ and /ʃ/ sounds in the initial position while taking the aforementioned factors into account. The data was from 48 L2 Thai learners, and the subjects were divided into two groups of university students: English-majors and non-English-majors. The two target sounds: English /tʃ/ and /ʃ/ together with the Thai /tɕʰ/ sound were tested in 27 words (9 words for each target sound). The subjects produced the target sounds five times, and their production was transcribed by two British transcribers. The results showed that the subjects had high target-like production when producing /ʃ/ but low target-like production when producing /tʃ/. In finding the correlation between the factors and the target-like production, neither the vowel contexts nor the experience could account for the production. The only factor that relates to the production of English /tʃ/ and /ʃ/ was the target sounds, i.e. the number of the productions that was deemed non-target-like was significantly higher when the target sound was /tʃ/ than when it was /ʃ/. This suggests that the target sounds, rather than the L2 experience and the vowel contexts, play a significant role in L2 speech production.

SUMMARYDespite numerous altempts, the development of generalixed models capable of accurate predictions of the times from sowing to flowering (f) of crop plants in field environments has remained elusive. Models which seek to correlate ;ʃ with various states of environmental factors such as photoperiod, P, and temperature, T, using formal statistical procedures arc often complex. Here, we describe a family of photothermal responses (involving unambiguous parameters and limits) which quantify the linear, non-interacting effects of P and T not on ʃ but on 1/ʃ, i.e. on the rate of progress towards flowering. Based on these relations we suggest that the modelling of crop phenology will be simplified, more reliable and more biologically plausible.

AbstractThis study examines the social perceptions of the traditional Andalusian feature [ʃ] and the Castilian feature [tʃ] in the city of Huelva and the town of Lepe in Western Andalucía, Spain. A matched-guise experiment was created by digitally manipulating spontaneous speech from twelve Western Andalusian speakers, varying only in word-medial syllable-initial [tʃ] and [ʃ] for <ch> in disyllabic words. Based on 221 listeners from Huelva and Lepe, mixed effects linear regression models indicate that listeners evaluated speakers with [tʃ] guises as being of higher status, more cosmopolitan, and less friendly than speakers with [ʃ] guises. These findings interacted with speaker and listener gender, listener educational level, and listener origin. The implications are twofold: the traditional Andalusian feature is evaluated as less overtly prestigious than the supra-local Castilian feature; and, that two nearby communities of the same dialect variety may share similar language attitudes, but demonstrate nuanced differences in attitudes due to their unique historical and socioeconomic developments.

This paper deals with the acoustic nature of fricative palatal consonants [ʃ], [ʒ] in the speech of Batanja and Nacfala. The obtained results were compared with the acoustic nature of the equivalent consonants in standard Serbian and in the speech of Novi Sad. The results show that the fricatives [ʃ] and [ʒ] of Batanja and Nacfala speeches differ from standard Serbian and Novi Sad speech, but also they differ between themselves. This research also represents an introduction of the acoustic analysis of the speech of Batanja and Nacfala.

Purpose This study explores the role of overt and covert contrasts in speech perception by children with speech sound disorder (SSD). Method Three groups of preschool-aged children (typically developing speech and language [TD], SSD with /s/~/ʃ/ contrast [SSD-contrast], and SSD with /s/~/ʃ/ collapse [SSD-collapse]) completed an identification task targeting /s/~/ʃ/ minimal pairs. The stimuli were produced by 3 sets of talkers: children with TD, children with SSD, and the participant himself/herself. We conducted a univariate general linear model to investigate differences in perception of tokens produced by different speakers and differences in perception between the groups of listeners. Results The TD and SSD-contrast groups performed similarly when perceiving tokens produced by themselves or other children. The SSD-collapse group perceived all speakers more poorly than the other 2 groups of children, performing at chance for perception of their own speech. Children who produced a covert contrast did not perceive their own speech more accurately than children who produced no identifiable acoustic contrast. Conclusion Preschool-aged children have not yet developed adultlike phonological representations. Collapsing phoneme production, even with a covert contrast, may indicate poor perception of the collapsed phonemes.

The typical phonological development and phonological disorders are object of continuous studies in speech area, in order to characterize aspects such as phonemes acquisition, strategies of repairing presents in subjects produtions, articulatory and acoustic characteristics of sounds. In the last aspect, it becomes important, the comparison of speech data of adults and children to verify if the acoustic parameters are similar. Thus, the purpose of this study is to compare, with acoustic analysis, the prodution of [s] and [ʃ] of children with or without phonological disorders and adults, considering the acoustic parameters of duration of fricative noise, cutoff frequency of fricative noise, band of frequencies of stronger fricative noise concentration and formant transition of the following vowel. It was realized comparisons between the 31 subjects` data of speech, which were divided in three groups group of children with typical phonological development (average age of 7,12 (± 0,77)), group of children with phonological disorders (average age of 6,87 ((± 0,74) and group of adults (average age of 23,61 (± 3,445)). These subjects came from the schools of Santa Maria/RS city and from Speech Therapy and Audiology service of Federal University of Santa Maria and realized initial interview, screening and phonological evaluation. Speech data were collected in acoustically treated booth. To acoustic analysis there were used two softwares: Praat and Wavesurfer. To statistical analysis there were compared the group of children with typical phonological development to the group of children with phonological disorders and the group of adults to the group of children with typical phonological development. It was verified that, when some parameters are considered, such as duration of fricative noise and cutoff frequency of fricative noise, the children without phonological disorder productions are statistically equal to adults productions. Sometimes these groups productions are acoustically different, but not perceptually, what can be justified by the neuromaturational process, through which children are passing in the studied age. Yet, it was observed that the children with phonological disorder really performed substitutions of studied phones. An example of that is the case of [s], which was produced like a substitution, presents the same acoustic characteristics of an [s] correctly produced, this is, which represents the phoneme /s/. The parameters more efficient to differentiate [s] and [ʃ] were cutoff frequency of fricative noise and band of frequencies of stronger fricative noise concentration.
O desenvolvimento fonológico típico e o desvio fonológico são alvos de incessantes estudos na área da Fonoaudiologia, no sentido de buscar a caracterização de aspectos como aquisição de fonemas, estratégias de reparo presentes na produção dos sujeitos, características articulatórias e acústicas dos sons. Neste último aspecto, torna-se importante, também, a comparação entre os dados obtidos na fala das crianças com dados de fala adulta, no sentido de verificar se os parâmetros acústicos se assemelham. Assim, o objetivo deste trabalho foi comparar, com auxílio da análise acústica, as produções de [s] e [ʃ] de crianças com desenvolvimento fonológico típico e com desvio fonológico e de adultos, considerando os parâmetros acústicos de duração do ruído fricativo, frequência de corte do ruído fricativo, banda de frequências de maior concentração de ruído fricativo e transição formântica da vogal seguinte aos fones estudados. Foram realizadas comparações entre os dados de fala de 31 sujeitos, divididos em três grupos grupo de crianças com desenvolvimento fonológico típico (com idade média de 7,12 anos, ± 0,77), grupo de crianças com desvio fonológico (com idade média de 6,87 anos, ± 0,74) e grupo de adultos (com idade média de 23,61 anos, ± 3,445). Os sujeitos advinham de escolas da cidade de Santa Maria/RS e do Serviço de Atendimento Fonoaudiológico da Universidade Federal de Santa Maria e realizaram entrevista inicial, triagem e avaliação fonológica. Os dados de fala a serem analisados foram coletados em cabine tratada acusticamente e para a realização da análise acústica foram utilizados dois softwares: Praat e Wavesurfer. Para análise estatística dos dados foram realizadas comparações entre o grupo de crianças com desenvolvimento fonológico típico e o grupo de adultos e entre crianças com desenvolvimento fonológico típico e com desvio fonológico. Verificou-se que, quando considerados alguns parâmetros acústicos, como duração do ruído fricativo e frequência de corte do ruído fricativo, as produções das crianças com desenvolvimento fonológico típico são estatisticamente iguais às produções dos adultos. Por vezes, as produções desses grupos apresentam-se diferentes acusticamente, mas não perceptivo-auditivamente, o que pode ser justificado pelo processo neuromaturacional que as crianças estão passando na idade pesquisada. Ainda, observou-se que as crianças com desvio fonológico apresentavam realmente substituições envolvendo os fones estudados. Um exemplo sobre este fato é o caso do [s] fruto de uma substituição (quando o alvo era o fonema /ʃ/) apresentar as mesmas características acústicas que um [s] corretamente produzido, isto é, que representa fonema /s/. Os parâmetros que se mostraram os mais eficientes na diferenciação dos fones [s] e [ʃ] foram frequência de corte do ruído fricativo e banda de frequências de concentração do ruído fricativo, para adultos e crianças com desenvolvimento fonológico típico.

Spectral Moment Analysis has helped further our understanding of the spectral properties of obstruent speech production; however, the physiologic correlates of these spectral measures are not well understood. The aim of the present study was to examine the possible correlations between the linguapalatal contact patterns used to produce the fricatives /s/ and /ʃ/ and the resulting spectral characteristics. Using spectral moment analysis and electropalatography (EPG), the real-word productions of eight speakers of American English were investigated. The spectral measures for the fricative tokens in the present study were found to be similar to data reported in previous research with adult speakers. Although the majority of the correlations examined in this study were found to be statistically significant, none of the correlations accounted for a large proportion of the variance in the data. Generally the strongest correlations were found between the spectral mean and the symmetry of the contact pattern in the anterior region of the hard palate and the width of the contact pattern in the medial region of the palate. These findings may indicate that although the width and symmetry of linguapalatal contact contributes to the spectral signature /s/ and /ʃ/ fricatives, they are likely only part of a much more complex process that may involve other mechanisms such as lip rounding, tongue groove depth and shape, aerodynamic factors, and the shape of the vocal tract in other regions.

Establishing the excitation spectrum of the nucleon would be a key advance to further our understanding of nucleon structure and Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD). Recent theoretical advances allow predictions of the excitation spectrum of the nucleon and other nucleon properties directly from QCD in the non-perturbative regime, via numerical methods (such as Lattice QCD), complementing existing constituent quark models. There is an ongoing world programme in meson photoproduction from the nucleon, which has already led to a number of nucleon resonances being discovered and established. This advance has largely been made possible by the first accurate measurement of polarisation observables. Available data has been obtained for proton targets, whereas for a complete picture of meson photoproduction, data from the neutron must also be obtained. This is important, as nucleon resonances can have very different photo-couplings to the proton and neutron. This thesis presents the first measurement of the E double-polarisation observable for the exclusive γn → K+Ʃ- reaction using a polarised hydrogen-deuterium target from the g14 run period at CLAS. Circularly polarised photons of energies between 1:1 and 2:3 GeV were used, with results shown in 200 MeV bins in Eγ and bins of 0:4 in cos θC.M./K+. Further to this, CLAS has undergone a detector upgrade in order to facilitate electrons of up to 12 GeV from Jefferson Lab's upgraded accelerator. Essential to this, is a new system for tagging quasi-real photons by detecting electrons scattered at very small angles. My work includes significant contributions to the design, realisation and construction of a hodoscope for this forward photon tagging apparatus. Presented in this thesis is a comprehensive overview of my work in developing and constructing the scintillating hodoscope for the CLAS12 Forward Tagger.

碩士
靜宜大學
英國語文學系研究所
96
This study investigated the acquisition of English /dʒ, tʃ, ʃ/ segments by Mandarin Chinese learners of English in an EFL context in Taiwan. The author adopted a multivariate approach to language performance based on the variationist framework, focusing on modification strategies of vowel epenthesis and substitution. Participants were thirty-five university freshmen of high and low English proficiency levels, and they performed three oral tasks including reading a word list, reading a story, and retelling the story. A supplementary speech perception test yielded results regarding the participants’ ability to recognize differences in individual word speech. The VARBRUL statistical program was used to analyze the data. The results showed that the phonetic environment, speech style, and learners’ development stage significantly contributed to the accurate production of English /dʒ, tʃ, ʃ/; L1 transfer and cross-language similarity also had an impact on the variation. English /dʒ, tʃ, ʃ/ are mastered faster when they are followed by rounded vowels, and learners have greatest difficulty if the sounds in question are followed by high-front vowels /i, ɪ/ (e.g., gym, cheap, ship); and the second most difficult environment is when the segments are followed by mid-front vowels such as /ɛ, e/ (e.g., gentle, cherish, shave). The study also yielded the linguistic environment weight (Bailey, 1973) for the three sounds in question. Finally, some implications for teaching pedagogy were derived from the study: 1. English /dʒ, tʃ, ʃ/ in the heaviest environment (followed by rounded vowels) can be taught at the beginning stage, 2. an innovative approach, proposed by Rau (1995), to facilitate learners to master /dʒ, tʃ, ʃ/ in the lightest environment can be a positive alternative for English teaching in Taiwan.

It is a general belief in Japan that the English /s/ and /ʃ/ before high front vowels (as in "see" and "she") are problematic for Japanese ESL (English-as-a-second-language) learners. Some research has also reported the /s/ and /ʃ/ confusion by Japanese ESL learners. Their pronunciation errors are often explained based on phonetics, but there are reasons to believe that the learners’ knowledge of the phonemes of the target words is at fault. This study examines 1) whether monolingual Japanese speakers distinguish the [si] and [ʃi] syllables in both perception and production in the Japanese contexts and 2) what would be the sources of Japanese speakers’ challenges in mastering the distinction between [si] and [ʃi] in their English production if Japanese speakers can produce and perceive the difference between these syllables. This study conducted two experiments. In the first experiment, 93 monolingual Japanese speakers between the ages of 17 and 89 in and around Tôkyô read aloud the written stimuli that had [si] and [ʃi] in the Japanese contexts, repeated the sound stimuli that had [si] and [ʃi] in the Japanese contexts, and listened to the [si:] and [ʃi:] syllables in isolation recorded by a native speaker of Canadian English. The results showed that the participants all distinguished [si] and [ʃi] in both perception and production regardless of their ages. Based on these results, I hypothesized that the [s] and [ʃ] confusion by Japanese ESL learners is caused by misunderstanding, rather than an inability to articulate these sounds. In the second experiment, 27 Japanese ESL students were recorded reading an English passage. The passage contains /s/ (7 times) and /ʃ/ (11 times) before high front vowels. After the reading, the participants were taught the basic English phonological system and the symbol-sound correspondence rules such as “s”-/s/ and “sh”-/ʃ/. The lesson lasted 40 minutes during which the participants were also interviewed to find out their awareness of the symbol-sound correspondence. No articulation explanations were given during the lesson. After the lesson, the participants read the same passage. The results showed that /s/ and /ʃ/ were mispronounced 39 and 67 times respectively in total by the 27 participants before the lesson, but only 7 and 19 times after the lesson. These changes are statistically significant. Moreover, the interview during the lesson revealed that the participants lacked phonological awareness in English as well as the knowledge of the symbol-sound correspondence rules. This study concluded that many of the mispronunciations by Japanese ESL learners, including /s/ and /ʃ/, can be solved by teaching the English phonics rules and some basic phonological rules without teaching the articulation of these sounds.

This study reports articulatory and acoustic data for three Catalan dialects (Eastern, Western, Valencian), showing that the sequences /tsʃ/ and /sʃ/, and /tʃs/ and /ʃs/, are implemented through analogous production mechanisms and therefore that fricative+fricative and affricate+fricative sequences behave symmetrically at the articulatory level. Analysis results also reveal a clear trend for regressive assimilation in the case of /(t)sʃ/ and for blending or a two-target realization in the case of /(t)ʃs/; differences in degree of articulatory complexity among the segmental sequences under analysis account for these production strategies. Moreover, the final phonetic outcome is strongly dependent on the dialect-dependent articulatory differences in fricative articulation; thus, in Valencian, /(t)sʃ / may undergo regressive assimilation or blending and /(t)ʃs/ regressive assimilation, owing to a more anterior lingual constriction for /ʃ/ than in the other dialects.

Affricates represent an analytic challenge, as a category intermediate between simple stops and a sequence of a stop and a fricative. The paper traces the historical evidence for the development of OE [c], a single segment, to palatal [c^j], assibilated [t^ʃ], the sequence [tʃ], and back to a single segment contour /t͡ʃ/, building on diagnostics like the blocking property of medial clusters versus singletons in resolution in OE verse, alliteration, metrical treatment in terms of syllable weight, data from language acquisition, phonetics in terms of durational properties, the interaction with Middle English sound changes, as well as the early neutralization of the singleton-geminate contrast. Further support comes from spelling, including a possible Celtic origin for OE <cg>, and <ch> spellings in LAEME as evidence supporting Orthographic Remapping of Palatal c. Finally, the author considers the impact of Old French loanwords, where the simplification of affricates in Anglo-Norman is argued to be delayed compared to Central French due to the existence of the sequences [tʃ] and [dʒ] in Middle English.

In Chapter 7 we saw that the fact that minerals are to a good approximation incompressible means that the effect of pressure on the Gibbs free energy of solid phases is very easily calculated. Thus, in general and, because V for solids can often be considered independent of P, This, combined with the more complex integration of dG over a temperature interval at one bar pressure, allowed us to calculate the position of phase boundaries at high pressures and temperatures. The next question is how to evaluate the pressure integral (11.1) when a fluid such as H2O or CO2 is involved, either in the pure form, mixed with other fluid components, or reacting with solid phases? Obviously, assuming that the molar volume of a fluid is a constant is not even approximately true, and is unacceptable. A possible way to proceed would be to express V as a function of P in some sort of power series, just as we did for Cp as a function of T (equation 7.12). VdP could then be integrated, and we could determine the values of the power series coefficients for each gas or fluid and tabulate them as we do for the Maier-Kelley coefficients. Fortunately, thanks to the insight of G.N. Lewis, we can proceed in a simpler and completely different fashion. Lewis in 1901 defined a new function, the fugacity, which can be thought of as a kind of idealized or thermodynamic pressure, which expresses the value of ʃ V dP single-handedly.