Abstract
The structural and functional organization of any biophysical system provides potentially important information on the underlying control structure. For speech, the anatomical and physiological structure of the vocal tract and the apparent functional nature of speech motor actions suggest a characteristic control structure in which the entire vocal tract is the smallest functional unit. Sounds are coded as different relative vocal tract configurations generated from neuromuscular specifications of characteristic articulatory actions. Sensorimotor processes are applied to the entire vocal tract to scale and sequence changes in vocal tract states. Sensorimotor mechanisms are viewed as a means to adjust speech motor output predictively in the face of continuously changing peripheral conditions. An underlying oscillatory process is hypothesized as the basis for sequential speech adjustments in which a centrally-generated rhythm is modulated according to internal (task) requirements and the constantly changing configurational state of the vocal tract.
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