EPG characteristics of velar stops in normal adult English speakers

This study aimed to determine the main characteristics of normal tongue palate patterns for velar stops. EPG data from the EUR-ACCOR database were analysed for nonsense VCV sequences containing /k/ in nine vowel contexts for seven English speaking adults. Incomplete EPG closure across the palate for /k/ occurred in 19% (range 4%-41%) of utterances with the most number of incomplete closures in /aka/ and the least in /uki/. As predicted, place of articulation was dependant on vowel context. The most fronted was the velar occlusion in /iki/ and the most retracted in /aka/. In terms of amount of contact, /k/ in /iki/ environment had almost twice as much tongue palate contact compared to /aka/ in all speakers (mean 42% for /iki/ compared to 22% for /aka/). There was considerable interspeaker variability in all variables. The implications of the results for diagnosing and treating speech disorders are discussed.casl[1] Fitzpatrick, L., Chasaide, A. N. 2002. Estimating lingual constriction location in high vowels: a comparison of EMA- and EPG-based measures. Journal of Phonetics, 30, 397-415. [2] Fletcher, S.G. 1989. Palatometric specification of stop, affricate and sibilant sounds. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research, 32, 736-748. [3] McLeod, S. 2006. Australian adults' production of /n/: an EPG investigation. Clinical Linguistics and Phonetics, 20, 99-107. [4] Recasens, D., Farnetani, E., Fontdevila, J., Pallares, M. D. 1993. An Electropalatographic Study of Alveolar and Palatal Consonants in Catalan and Italian. Language and Speech, 36 (2, 3), 213-234. [5] Gibbon, F.E., Paterson, L. 2006. A survey of speech and language therapists' views on electropalatography therapy outcomes in Scotland. Child Language Teaching and Therapy, 22, 275-292. [6] Marchal, A., Hardcastle, W. J. 1993. ACCOR: Instrumentation and database for the cross-language study of coarticulation. Language and Speech, 36, 137 - 153. [7] Wrench, A.A., Gibbon, F.E., McNeill, A.M., Wood, S.E. 2002. An EPG therapy protocol for remediation and assessment of articulation disorders. In: Hansen, J.H.L., Pellom, B. (eds) Proceedings of ICSLP-2002, 965-968. Also on CD-ROM. [8] Gibbon, F., Hardcastle, W., & Nicolaidis, K. 1993. Temporal and spatial aspects of lingual coarticulation in /kl/ sequences: a cross-linguistic investigation. Language and Speech, 36 (2, 3), 261-277. [9] Liker, M., Gibbon, F.E., Wrench, A., Horga, D. 2007. Articulatory characteristics of the occlusion phase of // compared to /t/ in adult speech. Advances in Speech- Language Pathology, 9 (1), 101-108. [10] Gibbon, F.E., Yuen, I., Lee, A., Adams, L. 2007. Normal adult speakers' tongue palate contact patterns for alveolar oral and nasal stops. Advances in Speech-Language Pathology, 9 (1), 82-89. [11] Gibbon, F. E., Crampin, L. 2001. An electropalatographic investigation of middorsum palatal stops in an adult with repaired cleft palate. Cleft Palate Craniofacial Journal, 38, 96-105. [12] Peterson-Falzone, S. J. 1989. Compensatory articulations in cleft palate speakers: Relative incidence by type. Proceedings of the International Congress on Cleft Palate and Related Craniofacial Anomalies, Jerusalem, Israel.pub31pu