Feature Channels: Speech & Language

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Astronomers are one step closer to revealing the properties of dark matter enveloping our Milky Way galaxy, thanks to a new map of twelve streams of stars orbiting within our galactic halo.

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The world’s very first invention of writing took place over 5000 years ago in the Middle East, before it was reinvented in China and Central America.

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Dog brains can detect speech, and show different activity patterns to a familiar and an unfamiliar language, a new brain imaging study by researchers from the Department of Ethology, Eötvös Loránd University (Hungary) finds.

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Researchers have found a way to make AI-generated voices, such as digital personal assistants, more expressive, with a minimum amount of training. The method, which translates text to speech, can also be applied to voices that were never part of the system’s training set.

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Researchers at UC San Diego School of Medicine pinpoint the regions of the brain and neural mechanisms responsible for normal or impaired development of a child’s response to baby talk and why infants with autism do not typically respond well.

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Restoring hearing through cochlear implantation for children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) can help them understand spoken language and enhance social interactions, according to a study from Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago. The study reported long-term outcomes of the largest number of children with ASD who received a cochlear implant, with mean follow-up of 10.5 years.

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While elevated lead levels in children are a persistent public health problem, few prospective studies have examined the association of childhood lead levels with substance use in adolescence. A team of researchers, led by Meeyoung O. Min from the University of Utah’s College of Social Work, found there is a link between elevated blood lead level in preschool years and adolescent substance use and substance-related problems.

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By mimicking the sound of a smaller vocal tract, the researchers think, caretakers are cluing babies in to how the words should sound coming out of their own mouths.

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A baby’s first year is full of special milestones, including the first time eating solid foods. At around 6 months, most babies can transition to food other than breast milk or formula, but some babies with special needs may not show signs of readiness at that age.

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Researchers observed a professional soprano singing with and without six types of masks and found masks effectively block aerosols, forcing the breath to exit at the sides. From there, the aerosols travel upward, rising with the upward flow of body heat from the singer. At low frequencies, masks reduced volume but did not have other effects on the singing. However, masks did reduce the power of higher frequencies, which made the enunciation of words less clear and altered the timbre. Masks had no effect on the pitch.

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Difficulty in understanding speech, especially in background noise, is a common concern for older adults. Using a word identification task in quiet and noisy conditions, researchers examined the impact of mild dementia on speech perception. They tested individuals with and without mild dementia and found that word identification scores of those without dementia were significantly better in all conditions, meaning people with mild dementia symptoms recalled fewer words in both quiet and noisy situations.

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Techniques in neuroimaging and neurocomputational modeling are leading to a much better understanding of brain function during speech and how stuttering arises. Inside the brain, one circuit initiates the desired speech in the basal ganglia, while another circuit coordinates the muscles needed to generate the speech. Stuttering stems from the initiation of speech, so only the first of the two circuits is impaired. This theory matches behavioral observations of stuttering.

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In the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, researchers report developing a database of speech samples from children ages 5 to 18 to explore two questions: What types of changes occur in children's voices as they become adults, and how do listeners adjust to the enormous variability in acoustic patterns across speakers? When they presented listeners with both syllables and sentences from different speakers, gender identification improved for sentences. They said this supports the stylistic elements of speech that highlight gender differences and come across better in sentences.

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A new UC Davis MIND Institute study suggests that parent-led language testing delivered via telehealth is effective for children with autism. The format was tested in both English and Spanish-speaking families and may provide a new way to measure the efficacy of treatments.

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Most people around the world agree that the made-up word ‘bouba’ sounds round in shape, and the made-up word ‘kiki’ sounds pointy – a discovery that may help to explain how spoken languages develop, according to a new study.