PERCEPTUAL CATEGORIZATION OF SYNTHESIZED ENGLISH VOWELS FROM BIRTH TO ADULTHOOD

The goal of this experiment is to determine the influence of non uniform vocal tract growth on the ability to reach acoustic-perceptual targets for English vowels. An articulatory-to-acoustic model integrating non uniform vocal tract growth was used to synthesize 342 5-formant vowels, covering maximal vowel spaces for speakers at 5 growth stages: newborn, 4 years, 10 years, 16 years, and 21 years old (adult stage). 37 American English speakers participated in a perceptual categorization experiment. Results indicated that the three cardinal vowels /i u æ / can be perceived by speakers based on a newborn-like vocal tract. Articulatory-to-acoustic relationships for a given vowel may differ across growth stages