Dipartimento di Studi Linguistici e Letterari, Università degli Studi di Padova, Italy.
Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats, Barcelona, Spain.
J Speech Lang Hear Res. 2019 Sep 20;62(9):3204-3219. doi: 10.1044/2019_JSLHR-S-18-0493. Epub 2019 Sep 3.
Purpose Previous studies have investigated the effects of the inability to produce hand gestures on speakers' prosodic features of speech; however, the potential effects of encouraging speakers to gesture have received less attention, especially in naturalistic settings. This study aims at investigating the effects of encouraging the production of hand gestures on the following speech correlates: speech discourse length (number of words and discourse length in seconds), disfluencies (filled pauses, self-corrections, repetitions, insertions, interruptions, speech rate), and prosodic properties (measures of fundamental frequency [F0] and intensity). Method Twenty native Italian speakers took part in a narration task in which they had to describe the content of short comic strips to a confederate listener in 1 of the following 2 conditions: (a) nonencouraging condition (N), that is, no instructions about gesturing were given, and (b) encouraging condition (E), that is, the participants were instructed to gesture while telling the story. Results Instructing speakers to gesture led effectively to higher gesture rate and salience. Significant differences were found for (a) discourse length (e.g., the narratives had more words in E than in N) and (b) acoustic measures (F0 maximum, maximum intensity, and mean intensity metrics were higher in E than in N). Conclusion The study shows that asking speakers to use their hands while describing a story can have an effect on narration length and can also impact on F0 and intensity metrics. By showing that enhancing the gesture stream could affect speech prosody, this study provides further evidence that gestures and prosody interact in the process of speech production.
目的 先前的研究已经调查了无法产生手势对说话者语音韵律特征的影响；然而，鼓励说话者做手势的潜在影响受到的关注较少，尤其是在自然环境中。本研究旨在调查鼓励产生手势对手语相关特征的影响：言语话语长度（单词数和秒数）、不流畅（填充停顿、自我纠正、重复、插入、中断、语速）和韵律特征（基频 [F0] 和强度的测量）。 方法 20 名母语为意大利语的参与者参加了一个叙述任务，他们必须向一个共谋听众描述短漫画的内容，分为以下 2 种条件之一：（a）非鼓励条件（N），即没有关于手势的指导，（b）鼓励条件（E），即参与者被指示在讲故事时做手势。 结果 指示说话者做手势有效地导致了更高的手势率和显著性。在以下方面发现了显著差异：（a）话语长度（例如，E 中的叙述比 N 中的叙述有更多的单词）和（b）声学测量（F0 最大值、最大强度和平均强度指标在 E 中高于 N）。 结论 研究表明，要求说话者在描述故事时使用手可以影响叙述长度，并且还可以影响 F0 和强度指标。通过表明增强手势流可以影响语音韵律，本研究进一步证明了手势和韵律在言语产生过程中相互作用。
