Soranee Holasuit Petty

Dysprosody in Broca's aphasia: a case study.

A detailed acoustic analysis of timing, intensity, and fundamental frequency (F0) at different levels of linguistic structure was conducted on the speech output of a Brocas aphasic who was a native speaker of Thai. Timing was measured with respect to syllables, phrases, and sentences in connected speech. Intensity variation at the sentence level was measured in connected speech. F0 variation associated with the five Thai tones was measured in both isolated words and connected speech. Results indicated that timing was differentially impaired depending upon complexity of articulatory gesture and size of the linguistic structure. Timing, as well as intensity, was aberrant at the sentence level. In contrast, F0 contours of the five tones were spared at all levels of linguistic structure. Findings are interpreted to support the view that dysprosody in Brocas aphasia is more applicable to speech timing than to F0.

Case study of a Thai conduction aphasic

Abstract A case study of a 55-year-old nonfamilial left-handed monolingual Thai patient with clinical and pathoanatomic evidence of major infarction in the left temporoparietal region is presented. He was studied at 9 years poststroke with a Thai adaptation of the Boston Diagnostic Aphasia Exam and supplementary tests. His language characteristics included fluent spontaneous speech, near-normal auditory language comprehension, and poor repetition, leading to a diagnosis of conduction aphasia. In regard to this aphasic syndrome, issues concerning classification, neuroanatomic correlates, and underlying neuropsychological mechanisms are addressed. The nature of his grammatical disturbance is examined critically in light of the notion of “information load.”

The Effect of Adventitious Deafness on the Perception and Production of Voice Onset Time in Thai: A Case Study

The perception and production of voice onset time (VOT) was investigated in a Thai patient with an adventitious, profound sensorineural heating loss. Thai exhibits a three-category voicing distinction for bilabial (/b, p, ph/) and alveolar (/d, t, th/) stops, and a two-category distinction for velar (/k, kh/) stops. VOT perception was measured in labeling responses to synthetic speech continua differing in VOT; VOT production was measured in word-initial stops of words produced in isolation. These measurements were compared with previously published VOT data for normal-hearing Thai speakers. The results of acoustic analyses of this subjects productions suggested only minor articulatory perturbations, and the target phonemes were generally identified accurately by normal listeners.

Timing disturbances in the speech of a language-delayed Thai adult.

An acoustic-perceptual investigation was performed on various aspects of timing in the speech of a 21-year-old adult speaker of Thai who reportedly did not start speaking until the age of 7. Selected aspects of timing included: ( I ) the voicing contrast in Thai homorganic word-initial stops; (2) the duration contrast in Thai short and long vowels; and (3) the duration patterns of phrases and sentences in Thai connected speech. Measures of stop consonant voicing and vowel length were taken from monosyllabic citation forms; measures of syllables, phrases and sentences from an oral reading of a paragraph-sized passage. Findings indicated that speech timing skills relatcd to stop consonant voicing, vowel length, and rhythm can be differentially impaired, and moreover, that the pattern of impairment appears to be related to the size of the temporal planning unit.