Department of Circuit Theory, Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Czech Technical University in Prague, Prague, Czech Republic.
Department of Circuit Theory, Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Czech Technical University in Prague, Prague, Czech Republic; Department of Neurology and Centre of Clinical Neuroscience, First Faculty of Medicine, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic.
J Voice. 2021 Nov;35(6):931.e21-931.e33. doi: 10.1016/j.jvoice.2020.02.022. Epub 2020 Mar 31.
The relevance of formant-based measures has been noted across a spectrum of medical, technical, and linguistic applications. Therefore, the primary aim of the study was to evaluate the effect of ageing on vowel articulation, as the previous research revealed contradictory findings. The secondary aim was to provide normative acoustic data for all Czech monophthongs.
The database consisted of 100 healthy speakers (50 men and 50 women) aged between 20 and 90. Acoustic characteristics, including vowel duration, vowel space area (VSA), fundamental frequency (f), and the first to fourth formant frequencies (F-F) of 10 Czech vowels were extracted from a reading passage. In addition, the articulation rate was calculated from the entire duration of the reading passage.
Age-related changes in pitch were sex-dependent, while age-related alterations in F/a/, F/u/, VSA, and vowel duration seemed to be sex-independent. In particular, we observed a clear lowering of f with age for women, but no change for men. With regard to formants, we found lowering of F/a/ and F/u/ with increased age, but no statistically significant changes in F, F, or F frequencies with advanced age. Although the alterations in F and F frequencies were rather small, they appeared to be in a direction against vowel centralization, resulting in a significantly greater VSA in the older population. The greater VSA was found to be related partly to longer vowel duration.
Alterations in vowel formant frequencies across several decades of adult life appear to be small or in a direction against vowel centralization, thus indicating the good preservation of articulatory precision in older speakers.
在医学、技术和语言学等多个领域的应用中，共振峰测量都具有重要意义。因此，本研究的主要目的是评估年龄变化对元音发音的影响，因为之前的研究结果存在矛盾。本研究的次要目的是为所有捷克单韵母提供正常的声学数据。
该数据库由 100 名年龄在 20 至 90 岁之间的健康发音者组成（男女各 50 人）。从阅读文章中提取了声学特征，包括元音持续时间、元音空间面积（VSA）、基频（f）和前四个共振峰频率（F-F）。此外，还根据整个阅读文章的持续时间计算了发音速度。
音高随年龄的变化与性别有关，而 F/a/、F/u/、VSA 和元音持续时间的年龄相关性变化似乎与性别无关。特别是，我们观察到女性的 f 随年龄的增长而明显降低，但男性则没有变化。就共振峰而言，我们发现随着年龄的增长，F/a/和 F/u/降低，但随着年龄的增长，F、F 和 F 频率没有统计学上的显著变化。尽管 F 和 F 频率的变化相当小，但它们似乎朝着元音集中化的方向发展，导致老年人群的 VSA 显著增大。更大的 VSA 部分与元音持续时间更长有关。
在成年后的几十年中，元音共振峰频率的变化似乎很小，或者朝着元音集中化的方向发展，这表明老年发音者的发音准确性得到了很好的保持。
