Speech Production In Individuals Research Articles

Limited connectedness of spontaneous speech may be a marker of dementia due to Alzheimer's disease.

The study evaluated the connectedness of spontaneous speech production in individuals with dementia as a potential predictor of dementia severity. Data were derived from the baseline sample of 143 individuals with dementia in the English Pitt corpus. Dementia severity was assessed via the Mini Mental Status Exam, the Mattis Dementia Rating Scale, and the Blessed Dementia Scale. Language abilities were evaluated using verbal fluency and picture description tasks. Graph analysis was carried out for the picture description task using the computational tool SpeechGraphs to calculate connectedness. Results demonstrated that higher educational attainment, higher verbal fluency and strongly-connected spontaneous speech were associated with better cognitive function. Results suggest that automated language processing approaches, such as graph structure analysis, may provide a faster and ecologically valid method of detecting dementia symptoms.

Characterising the speech phenotype in individuals with craniofacial microsomia: a scoping review protocol

IntroductionAsymmetric mandibular hypoplasia, microtia, tongue and laryngeal anomalies, and soft palate and facial nerve dysfunction are clinical features observed in children with craniofacial microsomia (CFM). Despite involvement of all these...

Longitudinal Effects of Parkinson's Disease on Speech Breathing During an Extemporaneous Connected Speech Task.

A critical component to the development of any type of intervention to improve speech production in individuals with Parkinson's disease (PD) is a complete understanding of the speech impairments present at each stage of the disease and how these impairments change with disease progression. The purpose of this longitudinal study was to examine the impact of disease on speech production and speech breathing during an extemporaneous speech task in individuals with PD over the course of approximately 3.5 years. Eight individuals with PD and eight age- and sex-matched control participants produced an extemporaneous connected speech task on two occasions (Time 1 and Time 2) an average of 3 years 7 months apart. Dependent variables included sound pressure level; utterance length; speech rate; lung volume initiation, termination, and excursion; and percent vital capacity per syllable. From Time 1 to Time 2, individuals with PD demonstrated decreased utterance length and lung volume initiation, termination, and excursion and increased speech rate. Control participants demonstrated decreased utterance length and lung volume termination and increased lung volume excursion and percent vital capacity per syllable from Time 1 to Time 2. Changes in speech production and speech breathing variables experienced by individuals with PD over the course of several years are related to their disease process and not typical aging. Changes to speech breathing highlight the need to provide intervention focused on increasing efficient respiratory patterning for speech production.

Speech Changes After Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation in Individuals Diagnosed With Parkinson's Disease

Purpose: Parkinson's disease (PD) is a progressive neurological disease that results in motor and cognitive impairments, including impaired speech production. Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is a noninvasive brain stimulation technique that shows promise in improving limb motor skills and executive function in individuals with PD. The aim of this study was to examine the impact of tDCS on speech production in individuals diagnosed with PD. Method: Six males, aged 65–78 years, with a diagnosis of PD, participated in a double-blinded controlled crossover study to assess the immediate effects of tDCS to the premotor cortex on speech production. Auditory–perceptual (Consensus Auditory–Perceptual Evaluation—Voice) and acoustic voice outcomes (e.g., fundamental frequency, intensity, noise-to-harmonic ratio [NHR], and speech rate) were gathered pre- and post-anodal simulation and sham conditions. Measures were compared across times and conditions. Results: Speech rate was below normative levels for all participants prior to tDCS. Speech rate increased significantly in conversation following stimulation but not sham conditions and exceeded normative values for two participants. NHR increased following stimulation. No significant difference in other perturbation measures, perceptual ratings, fundamental frequency, or intensity were noted. Conclusions: All participants completed the protocol without discomfort. The observed increase in speech rate needs to be interpreted in the context of excitation resulting from neurostimulation using tDCS.

The Impact of Parkinson's Disease on Breath Pauses and Their Relationship to Speech Impairment: A Longitudinal Study.

Purpose The purposes of this longitudinal study were to (a) examine the impact of Parkinson's disease (PD) progression on breath pause patterns and speech and linguistic errors and (b) determine the extent to which breath pauses and speech and linguistic errors contribute to speech impairment. Method Eight individuals with PD and eight age- and sex-matched control participants produced a reading passage on two occasions (Time 1 and Time 2) 3 years and 7 months apart on average. Two speech-language pathologists rated the severity of speech impairment for all participants at each time. Dependent variables included the location of each breath pause relative to syntax and punctuation as well as the number of disfluencies and mazes. Results At Time 1, there were no significant differences between the groups regarding breath pause patterns. At Time 2, individuals with PD produced significantly fewer breath pauses at major syntactic boundaries and periods as well as significantly more breath pauses at locations with no punctuation than control participants. Individuals with PD produced a significantly greater number of disfluencies than control participants at both time points. There were no significant differences between the groups in the number of mazes produced at either time point. Together, the number of mazes and the percentage of breath pauses at locations with no punctuation explained 50% of the variance associated with the ratings of severity of speech impairment. Conclusion These results highlight the importance of targeting both respiratory physiological and cognitive-linguistic systems in order to improve speech production in individuals with PD.

Direction-Specific Jaw Dysfunction and Its Impact on Tongue Movement in Individuals With Dysarthria Secondary to Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis.

Purpose The current study tested jaw movement characteristics and their impact on tongue movement for speech production in individuals with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Specifically, the study examined tongue and jaw movement in multiple directions during jaw opening and closing strokes in individuals with ALS and controls. Method Twenty-two individuals with ALS and 22 controls participated in the current study. Tongue and jaw movements during the production of the words "Iowa" and "Ohio" (produced in a carrier phrase) were recorded using electromagnetic articulography. Tongue and jaw distances were measured for jaw opening and closing strokes. Distance was measured in the anterior-posterior and superior-inferior dimensions (retraction, advancement, lowering, and raising). Results Findings revealed that individuals with ALS exaggerated their jaw opening movements, but not their jaw closing movements, compared to controls. Between the groups, a comparable tongue lowering distance was observed during jaw opening movements. In contrast, reduced tongue raising was observed during the jaw closing movements in individuals with ALS compared to controls. Conclusion The findings suggest that individuals with ALS produce excessive jaw opening movements in the absence of excessive jaw closing movements. The lack of excessive jaw closing movements results in reduced tongue raising in these individuals. Excessive jaw opening movements alone suggest a direction-specific jaw dysfunction. Future studies should examine whether excessive jaw raising can be facilitated and if it enhances tongue raising movement for speech production in individuals with dysarthria secondary to ALS.

Self-monitoring of speech production in individuals who stutter

Self-monitoring of speech production in individuals who stutter

Speech production, music therapy and celebral palsy

This paper deals with the analysis of music therapy interventions focused on the development of speech production in individuals with cerebral palsy (CP). The paper summarizes the results of theoretical analysis of the development of communication for persons with CP from the perspective of special education, speech therapy and music therapy intervention. The research methodology was based on qualitative design with a combination of content analysis and interpretive approach to case studies. The aim of the research was to determine the relationship between the level of speech production of people with CP and goals of music therapy intervention, its methods and procedures and musical materials used in music therapy practice. The research sample consisted of 10 individuals with CP and different levels of speech production. Data collection was based on an in-depth case analysis of available data from documents, video and audio recordings, music therapy products and interviews with music therapists. The research results have identified four stages of music therapy intervention (pre-verbal, semantic, phonological and stadium of complex linguistic phenomena). In each stage typical goals, methods and tools were described.

Influence of depressive symptoms on speech perception in adverse listening conditions

It is widely acknowledged that individuals with elevated depressive symptoms exhibit deficits in inter-personal communication. Research has primarily focused on speech production in individuals with elevated depressive symptoms. Little is known about speech perception in individuals with elevated depressive symptoms, especially in challenging listening conditions. Here, we examined speech perception in young adults with low- or high-depressive (HD) symptoms in the presence of a range of maskers. Maskers were selected to reflect various levels of informational masking (IM), which refers to cognitive interference due to signal and masker similarity, and energetic masking (EM), which refers to peripheral interference due to signal degradation by the masker. Speech intelligibility data revealed that individuals with HD symptoms did not differ from those with low-depressive symptoms during EM, but they exhibited a selective deficit during IM. Since IM is a common occurrence in real-world social settings, this listening deficit may exacerbate communicative difficulties.

Articulatory phonetics of coronal stops in monolingual and simultaneous bilingual speakers of Canadian French and English

Previous studies of bilingual speech production have relied on individuals whose age of acquisition of their second language varies. In the proposed research, we take advantage of the unique multilingual environment of Montreal and examine speech production in individuals who have acquired two languages from birth and compare the results to monolingual speakers. Electromagnetic recordings of single-word productions were carried out on three groups of female Canadian speakers (French monolingual, English monolingual, French-English simultaneous bilingual). Spectral moment and formant transition analyses of coronal burst segments showed cross-linguistic differences across vowel contexts. Tongue place of articulation and shape likewise indicated cross-linguistic differences in static articulatory positions. Kinematic analyses further identified language-specific movement patterns that helped clarify certain results from the acoustic analyses, namely that spatiotemporal characteristics of coronal articulation help enhance vocalic dimensions important to the respective language. Similar patterns were observed among the bilingual subjects, with the notable exception that acoustic and kinematic spaces narrowed considerably, resulting in reduced overlap between languages. It appears that simultaneous bilingual speakers not only follow language-appropriate articulatory and acoustic patterns, but further minimize areas of cross-linguistic convergence otherwise found among monolingual speakers.

Treatment for Apraxia of Speech in Nonfluent Variant Primary Progressive Aphasia

There is a growing body of literature examining the utility of behavioral treatment in primary progressive aphasia (PPA). There are, however, no studies exploring treatment approaches to improve speech production in individuals with apraxia of speech (AOS) associated with the nonfluent variant of PPA. The purpose of this study was to examine a novel approach to treatment of AOS in nonfluent PPA. We implemented a treatment method using structured oral reading as a tool for improving production of multisyllabic words in an individual with mild AOS and nonfluent variant PPA. Our participant showed a reduction in speech errors during reading of novel text that was maintained at one year post-treatment. Generalization of improved speech production was observed on repetition of words and sentences and the participant showed stability of speech production over time in connected speech. Results suggest that oral reading treatment may offer an efficient and effective means of addressing multisyllabic word production in AOS associated with nonfluent PPA, with lasting and generalized treatment effects.

Treatment for apraxia of speech in nonfluent variant primary progressive aphasia.

There is a growing body of literature examining the utility of behavioral treatment in primary progressive aphasia (PPA). There are, however, no studies exploring treatment approaches to improve speech production in individuals with apraxia of speech (AOS) associated with the nonfluent variant of PPA. The purpose of this study was to examine a novel approach to treatment of AOS in nonfluent PPA. We implemented a treatment method using structured oral reading as a tool for improving production of multisyllabic words in an individual with mild AOS and nonfluent variant PPA. Our participant showed a reduction in speech errors during reading of novel text that was maintained at one year post-treatment. Generalization of improved speech production was observed on repetition of words and sentences and the participant showed stability of speech production over time in connected speech. Results suggest that oral reading treatment may offer an efficient and effective means of addressing multisyllabic word production in AOS associated with nonfluent PPA, with lasting and generalized treatment effects.

Basic parameters of articulatory movements and acoustics in individuals with Parkinson's disease.

It has long been recognized that lesions of the basal ganglia frequently result in dysarthria, in part because many individuals with Parkinson's disease (PD) have impaired speech. Earlier studies of speech production in PD using perceptual, acoustic, and/or kinematic analyses have yielded mixed findings about the characteristics of articulatory movements underlying hypokinetic dysarthria associated with PD: in some cases reporting reduced articulatory output, and in other instances revealing orofacial movement parameters within the normal range. The central aim of this experiment was to address these inconsistencies by providing an integrative description of basic kinematic and acoustic parameters of speech production in individuals with PD. Recordings of lip and jaw movements and acoustic data were collected in 16 individuals with PD and 16 age- and sex-matched neurologically healthy older adults. Our results revealed a downscaling of articulatory dynamics in the individuals with PD, evidenced by decreased amplitude and velocity of lower lip and jaw movements, decreased vocal intensity (dB sound pressure level [SPL]), and reduced second formant (F2) slopes. However, speech rate did not differ between groups. Our finding of an overall downscaling of speech movement and acoustic parameters in some participants with PD provides support for speech therapies directed at increasing speech effort in individuals with PD.

Temporal parameters of speech production in bilingual speakers with apraxic or phonemic paraphasic errors

Background: The four‐level framework of speech production (Van der Merwe, 1997) suggests that language of production of a bilingual speaker can be viewed as a contextual factor increasing the complexity of speech production. A comparison of first‐ versus second‐language speech production in individuals with apraxia of speech or phonemic paraphasic speech errors may clarify the difference in the underlying disorders in these two populations. Aims: This study examined the effect of first‐ versus second‐language (L1 versus L2) speech production on specific temporal parameters of speech in bilingual normal speakers and bilingual speakers with either apraxic or phonemic paraphasic speech errors. The purpose was to determine if second‐language speech production will differentiate between normal speakers and speakers with speech‐level neurogenic disorders and between speakers with phonological planning or speech motor planning and programming disorders. Methods and Procedures: Three persons with apraxia of speech (AOS), three with phonemic paraphasias (PP), and five normal‐speaking participants were included in the study. Participants were required to read phonemically similar L1 and L2 CVC words in a two‐word carrier phrase, five times each, at a normal and fast speaking rate. Acoustic analysis of on‐target productions included vowel duration, utterance duration, utterance onset duration, and voice onset time. Data processing involved a descriptive approach using a measure of central tendency—the mean. Intra‐participant comparisons were made across contexts (L1, L2, fast speaking rate, and normal speaking rate). Outcomes and Results: Five participants with AOS and PP seemed to be influenced by speaking in L2 to a greater extent than the normal speakers and one participant with PP, in that they more frequently experienced difficulty with durational adjustments (decreasing duration in the fast speaking rate) in L2 than in L1. Furthermore, the participants with AOS or PP also exhibited a greater extent of durational adjustment in L1 than in L2. Conclusions: The results of this study suggest that L2 speech production is more challenging than speech production in L1 for participants with either AOS or PP. The current study could not differentiate between all speakers with a disorder in phonological planning and speakers with a motor planning and programming disorder. Individual patterns appear to exist in speakers with PP. Increased processing demands seem to impact on the phonological planning and the speech motor planning and programming levels of speech production.

Changes in Speech Production Associated With Alphabet Supplementation

This study examined the effect of alphabet supplementation (AS) on temporal and spectral features of speech production in individuals with cerebral palsy and dysarthria. Twelve speakers with dysarthria contributed speech samples using habitual speech and while using AS. One hundred twenty listeners orthographically transcribed speech samples. Differences between habitual and AS speech were examined for intelligibility, rate, word duration, vowel duration, pause duration, pause frequency, vowel space, and first and second formant frequency (F1 and F2) values for corner vowels. Descriptive results showed that intelligibility was higher, rate of speech was slower, and pause duration and pause frequency were greater for AS than for habitual speech. Inferential statistics showed that vowel duration, word duration, and vowel space increased significantly for AS. Vowel space did not differ for male and female speakers; however, there was an interaction between sex and speaking condition. Changes in vowel space were accomplished by reductions in F2 for /u/. Vowel space accounted for more variability in intelligibility than rate for AS; the opposite was true for habitual speech. AS is associated with temporal and spectral changes in speech production. Spectral changes associated with corner vowels appear to be more important than temporal changes.

Unaided AAC interventions such as manual signs appear to facilitate the development of speech. Rigorous research is required to establish the effects of AAC systems and interventions on speech production across a variety of populations with developmental disabilities1

What is the effect of augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) intervention on speech production in individuals with developmental disabilities? 1 Abstracted from: Millar, D. C., Light, J. ...

Altered patterns of cerebral activity during speech and language production in developmental stuttering. An H2(15)O positron emission tomography study.

To assess dynamic brain function in adults who had stuttered since childhood, regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) was measured with H2O and PET during a series of speech and language tasks designed to evoke or attenuate stuttering. Speech samples were acquired simultaneously and quantitatively compared with the PET images. Both hierarchical task contrasts and correlational analyses (rCBF versus weighted measures of dysfluency) were performed. rCBF patterns in stuttering subjects differed markedly during the formulation and expression of language, failing to demonstrate left hemispheric lateralization typically observed in controls; instead, regional responses were either absent, bilateral or lateralized to the right hemisphere. Significant differences were detected between groups when all subjects were fluent-during both language formulation and non-linguistic oral motor tasks-demonstrating that cerebral function may be fundamentally different in persons who stutter, even in the absence of stuttering. Comparison of scans acquired during fluency versus dysfluency-evoking tasks suggested that during the production of stuttered speech, anterior forebrain regions-which play an a role in the regulation of motor function-are disproportionately active in stuttering subjects, while post-rolandic regions-which play a role in perception and decoding of sensory information-are relatively silent. Comparison of scans acquired during these conditions in control subjects, which provide information about the sensorimotor or cognitive features of the language tasks themselves, suggest a mechanism by which fluency-evoking maneuvers might differentially affect activity in these anterior and posterior brain regions and may thus facilitate fluent speech production in individuals who stutter. Both correlational and contrast analyses suggest that right and left hemispheres play distinct and opposing roles in the generation of stuttering symptoms: activation of left hemispheric regions appears to be related to the production of stuttered speech, while activation of right hemispheric regions may represent compensatory processes associated with attenuation of stuttering symptoms.

Oral air pressure and nasal air flow rate on levator veli palatini muscle activity in patients wearing a speech appliance.

This study was designed to determine if levator veli palatini muscle activity can be elicited by simultaneous changes in oral air pressure and nasal air flow when a speech appliance is in place. The speech appliances routinely worn by 15 subjects were each modified experimentally by drilling a hole in the vertical center of the pharyngeal bulb. The air flow rate into the nasal cavity through the opening in the bulb was altered by changing the circular area of the opening in the bulb from the occluded condition (Condition I), to circular area of 12.6 mm2 (4 mm in diameter; Condition II), and then to 38.5 mm2 (7 mm in diameter; Condition III). Electromyographic activity was measured from the levator veli palatini muscle with changes in nasal air flow rate and oral air pressure. Levator veli palatini muscle activity was correlated with changes in nasal air flow and oral air pressure. Increases in levator veli palatini muscle activity were associated with increases in nasal air flow rate compared to oral air pressure changes. The results indicated that aerodynamic variables of nasal air flow and oral air pressure might be involved in the neural control of speech production in individuals wearing a speech appliance, even if the subjects exhibit velopharyngeal incompetence without using a speech appliance. Also, the stimulating effect of bulb reduction therapy on velopharyngeal function might be achieved through the change in aerodynamic variables in association with the bulb reduction.