Behrens S J
Department of Cognitive and Linguistic Sciences, Brown University.
Brain Lang. 1989 Aug;37(2):181-200. doi: 10.1016/0093-934x(89)90014-x.
Current production studies present a mixed view of right hemisphere-damaged (RHD) patients' ability to produce normal sentence intonation. The present study characterized the sentence intonation of RHD patients, focusing on a greater number of acoustic parameters than past works, and relying on more naturally elicited speech samples through use of a story completion task. Eight RHD speakers and seven nonneurological control subjects produced declarative and imperative sentences as well as yes-no and wh-questions. Slope of F0 change, linearity of pitch contour, and variance of F0 points were calculated for each utterance as a whole, as well as for the preterminal and the terminal contour separately. RHD contours were less linear and flatter in F0 decline than normal controls for the declarative sentences. The patients' yes-no questions also differed from normal productions, displaying smaller F0 dispersion around a mean F0. Preterminal range values were more restricted for patients' utterances of yes-no questions, while terminal properties between groups differed for three of the four sentence types examined. The present results suggest some disturbance in the patients' ability to manipulate fundamental frequency across sentential domains. These data are discussed in terms of current theories of a general dysprosody in RHD patients.
当前的研究对右半球损伤（RHD）患者产出正常句子语调的能力呈现出复杂的观点。本研究对RHD患者的句子语调进行了特征描述，关注的声学参数比以往研究更多，并通过故事完成任务使用更自然引发的言语样本。八名RHD患者和七名非神经学对照受试者产出陈述句、祈使句以及是非疑问句和特殊疑问句。计算每个话语整体的F0变化斜率、音高轮廓的线性度以及F0点的方差，同时分别计算终端前和终端轮廓的这些参数。对于陈述句，RHD患者的轮廓在F0下降方面比正常对照更不线性且更平缓。患者的是非疑问句也与正常产出不同，在平均F0周围显示出较小的F0离散度。患者是非疑问句话语的终端前范围值更受限，而在所检查的四种句子类型中的三种类型上，组间的终端属性存在差异。目前的结果表明患者在跨句子域操纵基频的能力存在一些障碍。这些数据根据当前关于RHD患者普遍韵律障碍的理论进行了讨论。
