Stutter Speech Analysis for Speech Recognition
Abstract—: Stuttering can be defined as speech with involuntary disruption, specially initial consonants. This paper focuses on MFCC (Mel Frequency Cepstral Coefficients) and different methods such as spectrogram analysis and speech waveform for stutter speech analysis. We use Cepstrum analysis to distinguish between a normal person’s speech and that of a stuttering subject. The database is recorded without noise to improve clarity and accuracy in determining Mel Frequency Cepstral Coefficients. We also use a spectrogram to show the clear difference between formant peak changes and how to estimate them for speech analysis and applications for disfluencies. These features can be used for enhancing speech recognition techniques such as security systems, call detection and automated identification for people with stuttering.
Keywords— Cepstral Analysis, Mel Frequency Cepstral Coefficients, Spectrogram, Stuttering. Introduction
Only 5% to 10% of the human population has a completely normal mode of verbal communication with respect to various speech features and healthy voice; and the remaining 90 % to 95 % suffer from one disorder or the other, such as stuttering, cluttering, dysarthria, apraxia of speech, etc. [1], [2]. Stuttering can be identified in people from their childhood and it can last till the end in some cases. It affects the fluency of the language. Most people produce brief disfluencies from time to time. For instance, some words are repeated and others are preceded by "um" or "uh." Disfluencies are not necessarily a problem; however, they can impede communication when a person produces too many of them. There are various types of stuttering which can be classified as shown in the
He described stuttering as having a glass wall preventing him from moving forward, regardless of the attempts made. I believe that this is a sound description of the ongoing and difficult battle of stuttering. I also feel that many people can relate to Liben’s statement as they may also go through frustrating situations in their lives. However, it is important to remember that a person with a stutter experiences frustrating situations more frequently. Not only as a clinician, but as a human being, I will be mindful of the daily struggles that come along with a fluency
Broca's Aphasia occurs from damage to the inferior frontal gyrus and affects speech production, which is why it is sometimes referred to as "non-fluent aphasia." People with Broca's aphasia are completely aware of their inability to produce speech fluently, so they often become frustrated.
The 1992 comedy crime film, My Cousin Vinny, written by Dale Launer and directed by Jonathon Lynn portrays the communication disorder known as stuttering. Stuttering is a fluency disorder in which the rhythm and flow of speech is disrupted and differs significantly from what is socially accepted as ‘normal’. Stuttering has proven to be one of the most common communication disorders portrayed in media and literature; however, the reason behind including a stutter (ranging from barely there to extremely excessive) in a character’s script tends to vary.
A speech sound disorder is the deviation in the articulation of phonemes that occurs past the age that it should have been acquired (American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, 2015). This means that the individual has difficulty in the pronunciation of sounds. Caroline struggled with the sound /th/ due to her frontal lisp, as well as struggled with the articulation of other phonemes such as /r/ due to an unknown cause. A lisp is a type of distortion. A distortion error is when the sound produced is in the same phoneme category but the phonetic accuracy is off (Gillam & Ford, 2012). This means the individual is pronouncing the sound incorrectly, but it is not changing the meaning of the
Stuttering affects the fluency of speech. Stuttering is characterized by disruptions in speech sound productions, also known as a disfluency. Mostly, stuttering has a significant effect on some daily activities. Though some people have disfluency deficits only in certain situations. Some people limit their participations in different everyday activities because they are often embarrassed or sad about their situation and are concerned about how other's will react to stuttering. In stuttered speech repetitions of words or also of parts of words are included. Prolongations of speech sounds may also occur. It is a characteristic of some people who
Davis, S., Shisca, D., & Howell, P. (2007). Anxiety in speakers who persist and recover from stuttering. Journal of Communication Disorders, 40, 398-417.
Theadore Rosevelt is trying to save all the resources. He is giving a great speech in Osawatomie, Kansas on August 31, 1910. He states the natural resources are being exhausted. He is trying to the save the resources before they are all used up before the next generation.
Stuttering is a neurological disorder of communication, from which the normal flow of speech is disrupted by repetitions (neu-neu-neuro), prolongations (biiiii-ol-ooogy), or abnormal stoppages (no sound) of sounds and syllables. Rapid eye blinking, tremors of the lips and/or jaw, or other struggle behaviors of the face or upper body may accompany speech disruptions ((3)). Why does stuttering worsen in situations that involve speaking before a group of people or talking on the phone, whereas fluency of speech improves in situations such as whispering, acting, talking to pets, speaking alone, or singing ((1))? In ancient times, physicians believed that the stutterer's tongue was either too long or too short, too wet or too dry. Therefore, practitioners from the mid-1800s tried surgical remedies such as drilling holes into the skull or cutting pieces of the tongue out to eliminate stuttering (1).
Imagine living during the 1960’s when the nation was divided by segregation. The only way to express your ideas, beliefs, and thoughts during that time was through words. Famous Civil Rights activists such as, Dr.Martin Luther King Jr., inspired many with his wise words and empowering speeches. Times when many felt unheard or invisible, words were there as tranquilness and an ataraxia. Words have the power to provoke, calm, or inspire by motivating others to take action in what they believe in.
Researchers have provided different classifications of speech errors. They can be categorized according to the “linguistic units,” such as “phonological feature, phoneme, syllable, morpheme, word phrase, or sentence levels” (Harely, 2001, p. 376). Moreover, speech errors can be classified according to the “mechanisms” of the speech errors (Harely, 2001, p. 376). For example, Carroll (2007) classified eight of the basic types of slips of the tongue according to the error mechanism from the previous psycholinguistic studies. These errors include shift, exchanges, anticipations, perseveration, additions, deletions, substitutions, and blends.
In this study there are two groups, the experimental group and the control group. The experimental group consisted of 90 preschool aged children who exhibited stuttering, and the control group consisted of 54 normally fluent children. The Independent variables were how many stuttering syllables per words read or spoken. This is a non-manipulated variable in the study. The manipulated independent variable was the score test to determine the severity of the fluency disorder. The Dependent manipulated variable was the authors, the speech pathologists, and the parents in the case study. They were able to influence the test by controlling certain aspects of the test. Subjects from the experimental group were referred to the University of Illinois Stuttering Research Project for speech evaluation on the resourcefulness of their parents, physicians, nurses, speech-language clinicians, and day care personal. All children in the stuttering group (experimental) met the following multiple objective and subjective criteria: (a) age 60 months or under, (b) regarded by parents as having a stuttering problem, (c) regarded by the two authors (certified speech pathologists with extensive experience with fluency disorders) as having a stuttering problem, (d) stuttering severity rated by parents as greater than 1 on an 8-point scale (0= normal; 1 = borderline; 2 = mild; 7 = very severe), (e) severity rating greater than 1 assigned by the two authors, (f) exhibiting at least three stuttering-like disfluencies (SLD, or part- and single-syllable word repetitions and blocks/sound prolongations) per 100 syllables, (g) stuttering histories of no longer than 6 months, and (h) no obvious neurologic disorders or abnormalities. Subjects from the normal fluency group (controlled) were (a) age 60 months or under, (b) reported by their parents as not having a history of stuttering, (c) regarded by the investigators
For example one question was, “does it prevent me from doing ordinary things?” It’s a yes and no answer because I still walk, and run it does not prevent me from doing things physical things, but when it comes to talking it’s a little bit more difficult and I struggle more. Stuttering makes things more challenging which is alright but you have to work more on how you talk. “Why can’t you speak correctly?” That is another question that anyone can ask and the truth is that it is a disorder in our speech sound of word, we repeat some of the words. “How does it feel to stutter?” To me as a stutter person it affects emotionally because sometimes I rather be quite and prevent talking and embarrassing myself. It affects us because of the way we communicate, it is not easy but we try to make it fluently as possible. (Question
Harely (2001) asserted that studies analyzing speech errors have enabled psycholinguists to propose models that explain the processing stages of the speech production in the brain. Similarly , Field (2005) claimed that speech errors show the order of the levels that the speakers go through to combine sounds, words, phrases, and sentences for producing the speech.
The acoustic speech signal itself can be analysed by creating spectrograms. Each speech signal contains information across multiple frequencies which, when charted on a spectrogram, tend to form bands known as formants. Initial attempts to understand speech percep...
Concerning improving speaking fluency and accuracy, Wang (2007) stated that speaking occurs spontaneously and transiently in real time, so producing spoken language can be