Lee Mary T, Thorpe Jude, Verhoeven Jo
City University London, Department of Language and Communication Science, Northampton Square, London, United Kingdom.
J Voice. 2009 Jan;23(1):82-7. doi: 10.1016/j.jvoice.2007.04.006. Epub 2007 Jul 23.
This paper investigates various aspects of intonation and phonation in young adults with Down syndrome. The speech of nine speakers with Down syndrome was analyzed acoustically for different aspects of intonation and phonation. The results of these analyses were compared to similar speech samples of nine typical speakers of Standard British English. The controls were matched for age and gender. Different aspects of speakers' individual pitch framework were analyzed, ie, organic and linguistic pitch ranges, voice compass, and declination. Phonation was investigated acoustically as maximum phonation time, jitter, and shimmer. The results suggest that speakers with Down syndrome exhibit normal respiratory capacity, a reduced organic pitch range, and a somewhat reduced linguistic pitch range. In terms of the melodic variation in the intonation patterns, a higher mean speaking fundamental frequency was found with generally a less melodious rendering of the intonation contours and a shallower declination. The analysis of phonation indicated reduced jitter, while shimmer did not deviate significantly from the control group. Although the observed deviations in the Down syndrome speakers are suggestive of lack of laryngeal control at the physiological level, it cannot be excluded at this stage that they may also reflect personality characteristics or the use of different linguistic strategies in implementing intonation patterns.
本文研究了唐氏综合征青年成年人语调与发声的各个方面。对九名唐氏综合征患者的语音进行了声学分析，以研究语调与发声的不同方面。这些分析结果与九名标准英式英语典型使用者的类似语音样本进行了比较。对照组在年龄和性别上进行了匹配。分析了说话者个体音高框架的不同方面，即器质性和语言性音高范围、嗓音音域和音高下降。通过最大发声时间、抖动和闪烁对发声进行了声学研究。结果表明，唐氏综合征患者表现出正常的呼吸能力，器质性音高范围减小，语言性音高范围也有所减小。在语调模式的旋律变化方面，发现其平均说话基频较高，语调轮廓的旋律性通常较差，音高下降较浅。发声分析表明抖动减少，而闪烁与对照组无显著差异。尽管在唐氏综合征患者中观察到的偏差表明在生理水平上缺乏喉部控制，但现阶段不能排除这些偏差也可能反映个性特征或在实现语调模式时使用不同的语言策略。
