15th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences (ICPhS-15)

Barcelona, Spain
August 3-9, 2003


Compiling Word Lists with Japanese Word Accent and Chinese Tone for Testing and Training of Discrimination Ability of Change in Voice Pitch Through Cochlear Implant

Liming Yang, Shizuo Hiki

Waseda University, Japan

A system has been designed for testing accurately and training effectively the discrimination ability of change in voice pitch through cochlear implant. The system utilizes speech samples in which change in voice pitch is controlled precisely by a computer program of speech analysis-synthesis, and cooperates with computer-assisted instruction in order to minimize the steps before achieving a goal. Japanese word accent of Tokyo dialect and syllabic tone of Standard Chinese were taken as the subjects for discrimination of change in voice pitch. Compilation of the word lists of the speech samples was based on the following phonetic considerations: 1) phonemic structure in the syllable 2) balance among phonemes in terms of their characteristics of both acoustical analysis and perceptual test, and 3) occurrence frequency of phonemes and syllables.

Full Paper

Bibliographic reference.  Yang, Liming / Hiki, Shizuo (2003): "Compiling word lists with Japanese word accent and Chinese tone for testing and training of discrimination ability of change in voice pitch through cochlear implant", In ICPhS-15, 1413-1416.