Speaking Rate Research Articles

Speed-Aware Audio-Driven Speech Animation using Adaptive Windows

We present a novel method that can generate realistic speech animations of a 3D face from audio using multiple adaptive windows. In contrast to previous studies that use a fixed size audio window, our method accepts an adaptive audio window as input, reflecting the audio speaking rate to use consistent phonemic information. Our system consists of three parts. First, the speaking rate is estimated from the input audio using a neural network trained in a self-supervised manner. Second, the appropriate window size that encloses the audio features is predicted adaptively based on the estimated speaking rate. Another key element lies in the use of multiple audio windows of different sizes as input to the animation generator: a small window to concentrate on detailed information and a large window to consider broad phonemic information near the center frame. Finally, the speech animation is generated from the multiple adaptive audio windows. Our method can generate realistic speech animations from in-the-wild audios at any speaking rate, i.e., fast raps, slow songs, as well as normal speech. We demonstrate via extensive quantitative and qualitative evaluations including a user study that our method outperforms state-of-the-art approaches.

The impact of headache intensity on speech in participants with migraine and acute post-traumatic headache.

Slower speaking rates and higher pause rates are found in individuals with migraine or post-traumatic headache during headache compared to when headache-free. We aimed to determine whether headache intensity influences the speaking rate and pause rate of participants with migraine or acute post-traumatic headache (aPTH) following mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI). Using a speech elicitation tool, participants with migraine, aPTH, and healthy controls (HC) submitted speech samples over a period of 3 months. Speaking and pause rates were calculated when participants were headache-free and when they had mild or moderate headache. In this observational study, speaking and pause rates in participants with migraine and aPTH were compared to HC, controlling for age, sex, and days since mTBI (participants with aPTH only). A total of 2902 longitudinal speech samples from 13 individuals with migraine (mean age = 33.5, SD = 6.6; 12 females/1 male), 43 individuals with aPTH (mean age = 44.4, SD = 13.5; 28 females/15 males), and 56 HC (mean age = 40.8, SD = 13.0; 36 females/20 males) were collected. There was no difference in speaking rate between HC and the combined headache cohort of participants (migraine and aPTH) when they had headache freedom or a mild headache. When participants had moderate intensity headache, their speaking rate was significantly slower compared to that of HC and compared to their speaking rate during mild headache intensity or headache freedom. For the combined headache cohort of participants, pause rates were significantly higher when they had headache freedom or had a headache of mild or moderate intensity relative to HC. Compared to participants' pause rate during headache freedom, their pause rate was significantly higher during mild and moderate headache intensity. Participants with aPTH had significantly slower speaking rates compared to participants with migraine during headache freedom, mild headache intensity, and moderate headache intensity. Participants with aPTH had significantly higher pause rates compared to participants with migraine when experiencing moderate headache intensity. For both aPTH and migraine, more severe headache pain was associated with higher pause rates and slower speaking rates, suggesting that speaking rate and pause rate could serve as objective biomarkers for headache-related pain. Slower speaking rate in participants with aPTH could reflect additional consequences of TBI-related effects on motor control and speech production.

The Contributions of the Cerebellar Peduncles and the Frontal Aslant Tract in Mediating Speech Fluency.

Fluent speech production is a complex task that spans multiple processes, from conceptual framing and lexical access, through phonological encoding, to articulatory control. For the most part, imaging studies portraying the neural correlates of speech fluency tend to examine clinical populations sustaining speech impairments and focus on either lexical access or articulatory control, but not both. Here, we evaluated the contribution of the cerebellar peduncles to speech fluency by measuring the different components of the process in a sample of 45 neurotypical adults. Participants underwent an unstructured interview to assess their natural speaking rate and articulation rate, and completed timed semantic and phonemic fluency tasks to assess their verbal fluency. Diffusion magnetic resonance imaging with probabilistic tractography was used to segment the bilateral cerebellar peduncles (CPs) and frontal aslant tract (FAT), previously associated with speech production in clinical populations. Our results demonstrate distinct patterns of white matter associations with different fluency components. Specifically, verbal fluency is associated with the right superior CP, whereas speaking rate is associated with the right middle CP and bilateral FAT. No association is found with articulation rate in these pathways, in contrast to previous findings in persons who stutter. Our findings support the contribution of the cerebellum to aspects of speech production that go beyond articulatory control, such as lexical access, pragmatic or syntactic generation. Further, we demonstrate that distinct cerebellar pathways dissociate different components of speech fluency in neurotypical speakers.

The Effect of Speaking Rate on Voice and Breathing Behavior

ObjectiveThe objective of the present study was to investigate the effect of fast speaking on pause duration, breath group duration, and fundamental frequency (FO) in rote speech (counting). Method28 healthy women (age 18-39) who had no experience of voice training, repeated a counting task in both a habitual and fast speaking rate. Pause duration, breath group duration and mean fundamental frequency was measured from audio recordings. Differences in the study variables between habitual and fast speaking rates were analyzed and tested for statistical significance. ResultsIn fast speaking rate, mean pause duration was shorter and mean breath group duration longer as compared with habitual speaking rate, both with statistical significance at the group level. Surprisingly, mean fundamental frequency was significantly lower in the fast-speaking rate condition. ConclusionThe results overall supported the hypothesis that pause duration becomes shorter and breath group duration longer with a fast-speaking rate. This may have clinical relevance for voice therapy and supports the importance of speaking rate for the understanding and treatment of some hyperfunctional voice disorders. Notably, however, our findings indicated that counting as a speech task induces a specific pattern which may not be comparable to other speech tasks, nor representative of spontaneous speech in every-day-life.

PaSCoNT - Parallel Speech Corpus of Northern-central Thai for automatic speech recognition

This paper proposed a Parallel Speech Corpus of Northern-central Thai (PaSCoNT). The purpose of this research is not only to understand the different linguistic characteristics between Northern and Central Thai, but also to utilize this corpus for automatic speech recognition. The corpus is composed of speech data from dialogues of daily life among northern Thai people. We designed 2,000 Northern Thai sentences covering all phonemes, in collaboration with linguists specialized in the Northern Thai dialect. The samples in this study are 200 Northern Thai dialect speakers who had been living in Chiang Mai province for more than 18 years. The speech was recorded in both open and closed environments. In the speech recording, each speaker must read 100 pairs of Northern-Central Thai sentences to ensure that the speech data comes from the same speaker. In total, 100 h of speech were recorded: 50 h of Northern Thai and 50 h of Central Thai. Overall, PaSCoNT consists of 907,832 words and 6,279 vocabulary items. Statistical analysis of the PaSCoNT corpus revealed that 49.64 % of words in the lexicon belongs to the Northern Thai dialect, 50.36 % from the Central Thai dialect, and 1,621 vocabulary items appeared in both Northern and Central Thai. Statistical analysis is used to examine the difference in speech tempo, i.e. time per phoneme (TTP), syllable per minute (SPM), between Northern and Central Thai. The results revealed that there were statistically significant differences speech tempo between Central and Northern Thai. The TTP speaking and articulation rate of Central Thai is lower than Northern Thai whereas SPM speaking and articulation rate of Central Thai is higher than Northern Thai. The results also showed that the ASR model training using Northern Thai speech corpus provides the lower WER% when testing using Northern Thai testing speech data and provides the higher WER% when testing using Central Thai Testing speech data and vice versa. However, the ASR model training using the PaSCoNT speech corpus provides the lower WER% for both Northern Thai and Central Thai testing speech data.

The relationship of rate and pause features to the communicative participation of people living with ALS.

Many people living with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (PALS) report restrictions in their day-to-day communication (communicative participation). However, little is known about which speech features contribute to these restrictions. This study evaluated the effects of common speech symptoms in PALS (reduced overall speaking rate, slowed articulation rate, and increased pausing) on communicative participation restrictions. Participants completed surveys (the Communicative Participation Item Bank-short form; the self-entry version of the ALS Functional Rating Scale-Revised) and recorded themselves reading the Bamboo Passage aloud using a smartphone app. Rate and pause measures were extracted from the recordings. The association of various demographic, clinical, self-reported, and acoustic speech features with communicative participation was evaluated with bivariate correlations. The contribution of salient rate and pause measures to communicative participation was assessed using multiple linear regression. Fifty seven people living with ALS participated in the study (mean age = 61.1 years). Acoustic and self-report measures of speech and bulbar function were moderately to highly associated with communicative participation (Spearman rho coefficients ranged from rs = 0.48 to rs = 0.77). A regression model including participant age, sex, articulation rate, and percent pause time accounted for 57% of the variance of communicative participation ratings. Even though PALS with slowed articulation rate and increased pausing may convey their message clearly, these speech features predict communicative participation restrictions. The identification of quantitative speech features, such as articulation rate and percent pause time, is critical to facilitating early and targeted intervention and for monitoring bulbar decline in ALS.

Listener effort quantifies clinically meaningful progression of dysarthria in people living with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a neurodegenerative motor neuron disease that causes progressive muscle weakness. Progressive bulbar dysfunction causes dysarthria and thus social isolation, reducing quality of life. The Everything ALS Speech Study obtained longitudinal clinical information and speech recordings from 292 participants. In a subset of 120 participants, we measured speaking rate (SR) and listener effort (LE), a measure of dysarthria severity rated by speech pathologists from recordings. LE intra- and inter-rater reliability was very high (ICC 0.88 to 0.92). LE correlated with other measures of dysarthria at baseline. LE changed over time in participants with ALS (slope 0.77 pts/month; p<0.001) but not controls (slope 0.005 pts/month; p=0.807). The slope of LE progression was similar in all participants with ALS who had bulbar dysfunction at baseline, regardless of ALS site of onset. LE could be a remotely collected clinically meaningful clinical outcome assessment for ALS clinical trials.

Effects of Speaking Rate Changes on Speech Motor Variability in Adults.

The relationship between speaking rate and speech motor variability was examined in three groups of neurotypical adults, n = 40; 15 young adults (18-30 years), 13 adults (31-40 years), and 12 middle-aged adults (41-50 years). Participants completed a connected speech task at three speaking rates (habitual, fast, and slow) where kinematic (lower lip movement) and acoustic data were obtained. Duration and variability were measured at each speaking rate. Findings revealed a complex relationship between speaking rate and variability. Adults from the middle age range (31-40 years) demonstrated shorter acoustic and kinematic durations compared with the oldest age group (41-50 years) during the habitual speaking rate condition. All adults demonstrated the greatest variability in the slow speaking rate condition, with no significant differences in variability between habitual and fast speaking rates. Interestingly, lip aperture variability was significantly lower in the youngest age group (18-30 years) compared with the two older groups during the fast speaking rate condition. Differences in measures of acoustic variability were not observed across the age levels. Strong negative correlations between kinematic/acoustic duration and lip aperture/acoustic variability in the youngest age group were revealed. Therefore, while a slow speaking rate does result in greater variability compared with habitual and fast speaking rates, longer durations of productions by the different age groups were not linked to higher spatiotemporal index (STI) values, suggesting that timing influences speech motor variability, but is not the sole contributor.

Prospectively accelerated dynamic speech magnetic resonance imaging at 3 T using a self-navigated spiral-based manifold regularized scheme.

This work develops and evaluates a self-navigated variable density spiral (VDS)-based manifold regularization scheme to prospectively improve dynamic speech magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) at 3 T. Short readout duration spirals (1.3-ms long) were used to minimize sensitivity to off-resonance. A custom 16-channel speech coil was used for improved parallel imaging of vocal tract structures. The manifold model leveraged similarities between frames sharing similar vocal tract postures without explicit motion binning. The self-navigating capability of VDS was leveraged to learn the Laplacian structure of the manifold. Reconstruction was posed as a sensitivity-encoding-based nonlocal soft-weighted temporal regularization scheme. Our approach was compared with view-sharing, low-rank, temporal finite difference, extra dimension-based sparsity reconstruction constraints. Undersampling experiments were conducted on five volunteers performing repetitive and arbitrary speaking tasks at different speaking rates. Quantitative evaluation in terms of mean square error over moving edges was performed in a retrospective undersampling experiment on one volunteer. For prospective undersampling, blinded image quality evaluation in the categories of alias artifacts, spatial blurring, and temporal blurring was performed by three experts in voice research. Region of interest analysis at articulator boundaries was performed in both experiments to assess articulatory motion. Improved performance with manifold reconstruction constraints was observed over existing constraints. With prospective undersampling, a spatial resolution of 2.4 × 2.4 mm2/pixel and a temporal resolution of 17.4 ms/frame for single-slice imaging, and 52.2 ms/frame for concurrent three-slice imaging, were achieved. We demonstrated implicit motion binning by analyzing the mechanics of the Laplacian matrix. Manifold regularization demonstrated superior image quality scores in reducing spatial and temporal blurring compared with all other reconstruction constraints. While it exhibited faint (nonsignificant) alias artifacts that were similar to temporal finite difference, it provided statistically significant improvements compared with the other constraints. In conclusion, the self-navigated manifold regularized scheme enabled robust high spatiotemporal resolution dynamic speech MRI at 3 T.

The use of deep learning integrating image recognition in language analysis technology in secondary school education.

This work aims to investigate the application of advanced deep learning algorithms and image recognition technologies to enhance language analysis tools in secondary education, with the goal of providing educators with more effective resources and support. Based on artificial intelligence, this work integrates data mining techniques related to deep learning to analyze and study language behavior in secondary school education. Initially, a framework for analyzing language behavior in secondary school education is constructed. This involves evaluating the current state of language behavior, establishing a framework based on evaluation comments, and defining indicators for analyzing language behavior in online secondary school education. Subsequently, data mining technology and image and character recognition technology are employed to conduct data mining for online courses in secondary schools, encompassing the processing of teaching video images and character recognition. Finally, an experiment is designed to validate the proposed framework for analyzing language behavior in secondary school education. The results indicate specific differences among the grouped evaluation scores for each analysis indicator. The significance p values for the online classroom discourse's speaking rate, speech intelligibility, average sentence length, and content similarity are -0.56, -0.71, -0.71, and -0.74, respectively. The aim is to identify the most effective teaching behaviors for learners and enhance the support for online course instruction.

Stretchable, flexible, and breathable MXene/dopamine/thermoplastic polyurethane nanofiber membrane with outstanding strain sensing and electromagnetic interference shielding performances

Outstanding strain sensing and electromagnetic interference (EMI) shielding performances are two important indicators for high-performance nanofiber membrane in flexible wearable electronic device. Here, simple electrospinning was employed to prepare the nanofiber membrane of thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) as substrate. Then high-performance nanofiber membrane was developed by synthesizing dopamine on TPU nanofibers to form poly-dopamine (PDA) coatings (named PT) and ultrasonically loading MXene on PT (labeled MPT). Specifically, TPU substrate provides flexibility and breathability, PDA coating improves the adhesion between MXene and TPU, and MXene contributes to strain sensing and EMI shielding performances. Owing to the PDA coatings, MPT nanofiber membrane has outstanding EMI shielding efficiency (EMI SE) of 69.86 dB at 150 μm thickness and an absolute effective shielding value of 8383.33 dBcm2g−1. The combination of PDA with MXene improves the EMI SE of the MPT membrane by ∼ 1.6 times compared to other TPU-based membrane. MPT strain sensor exhibits great sensing performance with a remarkable detection threshold of 0.1%, strain coefficient of up to 2600, broad working range of 200%, and rapid response/recovery time (77/186 ms). Meanwhile, MPT strain sensor also shows remarkable ability to real-time monitor human health/motion, such as joint bending, breathing, speaking and heart rate, which makes significant contributions in the field of smart medicine. This nanofiber membrane can provide a universal strategy for the development of intelligent wearable medical devices.

Improving Dysarthric Speech Segmentation With Emulated and Synthetic Augmentation.

Acoustic features extracted from speech can help with the diagnosis of neurological diseases and monitoring of symptoms over time. Temporal segmentation of audio signals into individual words is an important pre-processing step needed prior to extracting acoustic features. Machine learning techniques could be used to automate speech segmentation via automatic speech recognition (ASR) and sequence to sequence alignment. While state-of-the-art ASR models achieve good performance on healthy speech, their performance significantly drops when evaluated on dysarthric speech. Fine-tuning ASR models on impaired speech can improve performance in dysarthric individuals, but it requires representative clinical data, which is difficult to collect and may raise privacy concerns. This study explores the feasibility of using two augmentation methods to increase ASR performance on dysarthric speech: 1) healthy individuals varying their speaking rate and loudness (as is often used in assessments of pathological speech); 2) synthetic speech with variations in speaking rate and accent (to ensure more diverse vocal representations and fairness). Experimental evaluations showed that fine-tuning a pre-trained ASR model with data from these two sources outperformed a model fine-tuned only on real clinical data and matched the performance of a model fine-tuned on the combination of real clinical data and synthetic speech. When evaluated on held-out acoustic data from 24 individuals with various neurological diseases, the best performing model achieved an average word error rate of 5.7% and a mean correct count accuracy of 94.4%. In segmenting the data into individual words, a mean intersection-over-union of 89.2% was obtained against manual parsing (ground truth). It can be concluded that emulated and synthetic augmentations can significantly reduce the need for real clinical data of dysarthric speech when fine-tuning ASR models and, in turn, for speech segmentation.

Effects of Speaking Rate on Variability of Second Formant Frequency Transitions in Dysarthria

Introduction: This study examined the utility of multiple second formant (F2) slope metrics to capture differences in speech production for individuals with dysarthria and healthy controls as a function of speaking rate. In addition, the utility of F2 slope metrics for predicting severity of intelligibility impairment in dysarthria was examined. Methods: Twenty three speakers with Parkinson’s disease and mild to moderate hypokinetic dysarthria (HD), 9 speakers with various neurological diseases and mild to severe ataxic or ataxic-spastic dysarthria (AD), and 26 age-matched healthy control speakers (CON) participated in a sentence repetition task. Sentences were produced at habitual, fast, and slow speaking rate. A variety of metrics were derived from the rising F2 transition portion of the diphthong /ai/. To obtain measures of intelligibility for the two clinical speaker groups, 15 undergraduate SLP students participated in a transcription experiment. Results: Significantly shallower slopes were found for the speakers with HD compared to control speakers. Steeper F2 slopes were associated with increased speaking rate for all groups. Higher variability in F2 slope metrics was found for the speakers with AD compared to the two other speaker groups. For both clinical speaker groups, there was a negative association between intelligibility and F2 slope variability metrics, indicating lower variability in speech production was associated with higher intelligibility. Discussion: F2 slope metrics were sensitive to dysarthria presence, dysarthria type, and speaking rate. The current study provided evidence that the use of F2 slope variability measures has additional value to F2 slope averaged measures for predicting severity of intelligibility impairment in dysarthria.

Measuring Articulatory Patterns in Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis Using a Data-Driven Articulatory Consonant Distinctiveness Space Approach.

The aim of this study was to leverage data-driven approaches, including a novel articulatory consonant distinctiveness space (ACDS) approach, to better understand speech motor control in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Electromagnetic articulography was used to record tongue and lip movement data during the production of 10 consonants from healthy controls (n = 15) and individuals with ALS (n = 47). To assess phoneme distinctness, speech data were analyzed using two classification algorithms, Procrustes matching (PM) and support vector machine (SVM), and the area/volume of the ACDS. Pearson's correlation coefficient was used to examine the relationship between bulbar impairment and the ACDS. Analysis of variance was used to examine the effects of bulbar impairment on consonant distinctiveness and consonant classification accuracies in clinical subgroups. There was a significant relationship between the ACDS and intelligible speaking rate (area, p = .003; volume, p = .010), and the Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis Functional Rating Scale-Revised (ALSFRS-R) bulbar subscore (area, p = .009; volume, p = .027). Consonant classification performance followed a consistent pattern with bulbar severity, where consonants produced by speakers with more severe ALS were classified less accurately (SVM = 75.27%; PM = 74.54%) than the healthy, asymptomatic, and mild-moderate groups. In severe ALS, area of the ACDS was significantly condensed compared to both asymptomatic (p = .004) and mild-moderate (p = .013) groups. There was no statistically significant difference in area between the severe ALS group and healthy speakers (p = .292). Our comprehensive approach is sensitive to early oromotor changes in response due to disease progression. The preserved articulatory consonant space may capture the use of compensatory adaptations to counteract influences of neurodegeneration. https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.22044320.

Recursive Self-feedback Improved Speech Fluency in Two Patients with Chronic Nonfluent Aphasia

ABSTRACT Background Previous studies have demonstrated that people with nonfluent aphasia (PWNA) improve their language production after repeating personalized scripts, modeled by speech-language pathologists (SLPs). If PWNA could improve by using their own self-feedback, relying less on external feedback, barriers to aphasia treatment, such as a dearth of clinicians and mobility issues, can be overcome. Here we examine whether PWNA improve their language production through an automated procedure that exposes them to playbacks of their own speech, which are updated recursively, without any feedback from SLPs. Method We tested if recursive self-feedback could improve speech fluency in two persons with chronic nonfluent aphasia. We compared two treatments: script production with recursive self-feedback (a new technique) and a non-self-feedback training. We administered the treatments remotely to the participants through their smartphones using two versions of a mobile app we developed. Each participant engaged in each treatment for about three weeks. We estimated clinical improvements of script production through a quantitative trend analysis and nonoverlap of all pairs. Results Recursive self-feedback improved speaking rate and speech initiation latency of trained and untrained scripts in both participants. The control (non-self-feedback) training was also effective, but it induced a somewhat weaker improvement in speaking rate, and improved speech initiation latency in only one participant. Conclusion Our findings provide preliminary evidence that PWNA can improve their speaking rate and speech initiation latency during production of scripts via fully automated recursive self-feedback. The beneficial effects of recursive self-feedback training suggest that speech unison and repeated exposures to written scripts may be optional ingredients of script-based treatments for aphasia.

A Study of Developing a Prototype of Sindhi Primer of Early Childhood Education Level in Sindh

Sindhi is the most ancient language of the sub-continent and has been used as a medium of instruction in this region through centuries. The writing history of the Sindhi Language starts from Indus Civilization in the era of pictographic scripts being used for sister civilizations. Observing ground and historical realities, Sindhi is one of the most important languages of the world. For the study and development of language, it is necessary to develop primary textbooks. In our country, the teaching of language is a specialized skill. The primer (textbook) has a very milestone role in teaching and learning of respective language. The Sindhi Primers of public and private sectors were not as per the standard of other language primers. As per basic language skills textual and spelling forms' analysis, there were found only three primers of more than 50% success rate, while others were of very low standard with less than the success rate of 30%. Therefore it was a dire need to develop and design a Model Sindhi Primer based on the new revised National Curriculum with a 100% success rate of speaking, listening, reading, writing and understanding skills of the Sindhi Language for effective learning in early childhood class in schools of Sindh. The primer under research is an effective learning model primer which fulfils sufficient needs of learners and teachers for teaching and learning of Sindhi Language.The primer under research is also a Model Primer for textbook writers and authors in developing and designing any textbook in accordance with learning outcomes and objectives described in the curriculum.

MP75-08 PATIENT-PERCEIVED BARRIERS AND STIGMAS TO SEEKING HEALTHCARE FOR UROLOGY VS. NON-UROLOGY PATIENTS IN AN UNDERSERVED COMMUNITY CLINIC

You have accessJournal of UrologyCME1 Apr 2023MP75-08 PATIENT-PERCEIVED BARRIERS AND STIGMAS TO SEEKING HEALTHCARE FOR UROLOGY VS. NON-UROLOGY PATIENTS IN AN UNDERSERVED COMMUNITY CLINIC Tasha Posid, Aliza Khuhro, Zahra Khuhro, Alicia Scimeca, Dairon Denis-Diaz, Dinah Diab, Hafsa Asif, Chase Arnold, Kerestina Khalil, Lily Kaufman, Sabrina Amin, Dom DiGiacomo, Tyler Cronin, Michael Sourial, David Sharp, Courtenay Moore, Frank Begun, and Cheryl Lee Tasha PosidTasha Posid More articles by this author , Aliza KhuhroAliza Khuhro More articles by this author , Zahra KhuhroZahra Khuhro More articles by this author , Alicia ScimecaAlicia Scimeca More articles by this author , Dairon Denis-DiazDairon Denis-Diaz More articles by this author , Dinah DiabDinah Diab More articles by this author , Hafsa AsifHafsa Asif More articles by this author , Chase ArnoldChase Arnold More articles by this author , Kerestina KhalilKerestina Khalil More articles by this author , Lily KaufmanLily Kaufman More articles by this author , Sabrina AminSabrina Amin More articles by this author , Dom DiGiacomoDom DiGiacomo More articles by this author , Tyler CroninTyler Cronin More articles by this author , Michael SourialMichael Sourial More articles by this author , David SharpDavid Sharp More articles by this author , Courtenay MooreCourtenay Moore More articles by this author , Frank BegunFrank Begun More articles by this author , and Cheryl LeeCheryl Lee More articles by this author View All Author Informationhttps://doi.org/10.1097/JU.0000000000003349.08AboutPDF ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints ShareFacebookLinked InTwitterEmail Abstract INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVE: Physicians increasingly manage encounters with patients from diverse backgrounds. Given the sensitive nature of Urology as a specialty, whether underserved and underrepresented patients perceive similar barriers to seeking and accessing healthcare for their urologic condition is underreported. Our objective was to assess barriers to seeking/accessing healthcare for underserved patients. METHODS: Urology (n=46) and non-Urology (n=137) patients were seen at a local community clinic. 29.3% of patients spoke English as a first-language. Participants completed a short survey (standardized assessments) which asked them to provide demographic information, attitudes towards seeking/accessing healthcare (financial/insurance barriers, cultural/language barriers, health literacy barriers), plus perceived stigmas for their condition. RESULTS: Patients reported that financial/insurance barriers were the greatest obstacles for seeking and accessing healthcare (p<0.001), with less concern for culture/language and health literacy barriers. Urology patients reported greater financial (p<0.001) and culture/language (p<0.001) barriers than non-Urology patients. They also expressed greater perceived stigma (p<0.002) for seeking treatment for their specific condition. This effect was decreased by additional education (p=0.022). CONCLUSIONS: Urology patients seen at local, underserved community clinic boasting a high rate of non-English speaking and immigrants reported perceived stigmas regarding their condition compared to patients seen at the same clinic for non-urologic conditions. Given that health literacy was not associated with increased perceived stigma, our results suggest that cultural factors significantly affect this perception. These barriers and stigmas should be taken into consideration when training students and residents. Source of Funding: OSU Undergraduate Research Apprenticeship Program, OSUCOM Educational Research Stimulus Grant, AERA Research Service Projects Program, Arnold P. Gold Foundation © 2023 by American Urological Association Education and Research, Inc.FiguresReferencesRelatedDetails Volume 209Issue Supplement 4April 2023Page: e1081 Advertisement Copyright & Permissions© 2023 by American Urological Association Education and Research, Inc.MetricsAuthor Information Tasha Posid More articles by this author Aliza Khuhro More articles by this author Zahra Khuhro More articles by this author Alicia Scimeca More articles by this author Dairon Denis-Diaz More articles by this author Dinah Diab More articles by this author Hafsa Asif More articles by this author Chase Arnold More articles by this author Kerestina Khalil More articles by this author Lily Kaufman More articles by this author Sabrina Amin More articles by this author Dom DiGiacomo More articles by this author Tyler Cronin More articles by this author Michael Sourial More articles by this author David Sharp More articles by this author Courtenay Moore More articles by this author Frank Begun More articles by this author Cheryl Lee More articles by this author Expand All Advertisement PDF downloadLoading ...

Speech-in-speech perception: The role of F0, rate, and rhythm

Speech perception typically takes place against a background of other speech or noise. The present study aims to investigate the effectiveness of segregating speech streams within a competing speech signal, examining whether cues such as pitch that typically denote a difference in talker behave in the same way as cues such as speaking rate that typically do not denote the presence of a new talker. Native English speakers listened to English target speech within English two-talker babble of a similar or different pitch and/or a similar or different speaking rate to identify whether mismatched properties between target speech and masker babble improve speech segregation. Additionally, Dutch and French masker babble was tested to identify whether an unknown language masker improves speech segregation capacity and whether the rhythm patterns of the unknown language modulate the improvement. Individual differences in selective attention were also measured to determine whether they can predict speech segregation ability. This study aims to increase the understanding of speech perception in a more ecologically valid context and to identify whether there is a link between a cue’s potential to denote a new speaker and its ability to aid in speech segregation during competing speech perception.

The German hearing in noise test with a female talker: development and comparison with German male speech test

PurposeThe aim of the study was to develop the German Hearing in Noise Test (HINT) with female speaker by fulfilling the recommendations by International Collegium of Rehabilitative Audiology (ICRA) for using a female speaker to create new multilingual speech tests and to determine norms and to compare these norms with German male speech tests—the male speakers HINT and the Oldenburg Sentence Test (OLSA).MethodsThe HINT with a female speaker consists of the same speech material as the male speaking HINT. After recording the speech material, 10 normal hearing subjects were included to determine the performance–intensity function (PI function). 24 subjects were part of the measurements to determine the norms and compare them with the norms of male HINT and OLSA. Comparably, adaptive, open-set methods under headphones (HINT) and sound field (OLSA) were used.ResultsAcoustic phonetic analysis demonstrated significant difference in mean fundamental frequency, its range and mean speaking rate between both HINT speakers. The calculated norms by three of the tested four conditions of the HINT with a female speaker are not significantly different from the norms with a male speaker. No significant effect of the speaker’s gender of the first HINT measurement and no significant correlation between the threshold results of the HINT and the OLSA were determined.ConclusionsThe Norms for German HINT with a female speaker are comparable to the norms of the HINT with a male speaker. The speech intelligibility score of the HINT does not depend on the speakers’ gender despite significant difference of acoustic–phonetic parameters between the female and male HINT speaker’s voice. Instead, the speech intelligibility rating must be seen as a function of the used speech material.

Speaking Rate, Oro-Laryngeal Timing, and Place of Articulation Effects on Burst Amplitude: Evidence From English and Tamil.

The relationship between speaking rate and burst amplitude was investigated in plosives with differing oro-laryngeal timing: long-lag voice-onset time (VOT) (North American English) and short-lag VOT (Indian Tamil). Burst amplitude (reflecting both intraoral pressure and flow geometry of the oral channel) was hypothesized to decrease in pre-vocalic plosive syllables with the increase in speaking rate, which imposes temporal constraints on both intraoral pressure buildup behind the oral occlusion and respiratory air flow. The results showed that decreased vowel duration (which is associated with increased speaking rate) led to decreased burst amplitude in both short- and long-lag plosives. Aggregate models of bilabial and velar plosives (found in both languages) suggested lower burst amplitudes in short-lag stops. Place-of-articulation effects in both languages were consistent with models of stop consonant acoustics, and place interactions with vowel duration were most apparent with long-lag English stops. The results are discussed in terms of speaking rate and language-internal forces, contributing to burst amplitude variation and their implications for speech perception and potential to affect lenition phenomena.