Deck 12: Speech Perception

Question 1

The phenomenon in which one phoneme affects the acoustic properties of subsequent phonemes is known as ______.

A)the voicing constant
B)coarticulation
C)categorical perception
D)formant formation

Answer 1

B

Question 2

What is one advantage of the International Phonetic alphabet?

A)It represents meaning directly without regard to how a word is pronounced.
B)It provides a unique symbol for each and every phoneme in use in human languages.
C)It represents all the vowel sounds used in any language with just five symbols.
D)It can facilitate translation between languages that use different alphabets.

Answer 2

B

Question 3

Formants are the ______.

A)basic units of sound in human language
B)points along the vocal tract where airflow can be constricted to make certain sounds
C)placing of voicing in the speech signal
D)frequency bands with higher amplitudes among the harmonics of a vowel sound

Answer 3

D

Question 4

When you change the "a" in "pram" to the "i" in "prim," you have changed ______.

A)the placement of the uvula in your pharynx
B)your voicing of the word
C)a phoneme
D)your place of articulation

Question 5

To determine if the person you are listening to has just said, "The fryer gave potatoes to the chipmunk" or "The friar gave potatoes to the chip monk," you must know ______.

A)the exact pronunciation of each word
B)how to apply top-down processing to the situation
C)the schedule of coarticulation
D)whether the sentences are voiced or not

Question 6

If you came down with an illness that prevented your vocal cords from vibrating properly, this would likely have the greatest impact on your ability to produce ______.

A)consonants
B)vowels
C)pitch
D)formants

Question 7

In experiments on the McGurk effect, participants watch mouths talk, but hear an audio track that has been changed so it does not match what they see the mouths doing.The typical finding is that ______.

A)the visual stimuli, that is, the moving mouth, influences what people report hearing
B)in speech perception, the auditory mode is dominant, and speech perception is strictly a product of what is heard
C)the visual and the auditory perceptions interfere, rendering the stimuli incomprehensible
D)the participants attribute what they hear to the mouth in question, affecting their visual perception

Question 8

Fowler and Dekle (1991) asked participants to feel a mouth saying one set of syllables at the same time that they listened to a soundtrack playing another set.Fowler and Dekle found that participants ______.

A)could either comprehend the syllables they were feeling or those they were hearing, but not both
B)heard the syllables that they were feeling instead of what the soundtrack actually played
C)could not comprehend either the syllables they were feeling or those that they were hearing
D)heard the syllables being played by the soundtrack and failed to comprehend those they were feeling

Question 9

Speech sounds made with unrestricted airflow are known as ______.

A)reticulated sounds
B)ambient speech sounds
C)consonants
D)vowels

Question 10

The larynx is ______.

A)a structure that affects the pitches of sounds being made by the human vocal tract
B)the tube bringing air to and from the mouth
C)a structure in auditory cortex responsible for speech perception
D)a flap of tissue at the top of the throat that can close off the nasal cavity

Question 11

In an experiment, participants are shown a video of a person's mouth saying monosyllabic sounds, such as "ba," "da," and "tha." However, the audio component does not always match what the speaker's mouth was saying when the syllables were recorded.Researchers asked participants to identify the sound they heard.The purpose of this experiment was to determine whether ______.

A)sound influences what we see
B)vision and hearing occur simultaneously or sequentially
C)vision influences the sounds we hear
D)the conflicting signals would make perception impossible

Question 12

We say the phoneme "p" in the word pet in a slightly different way than we say the phoneme "p" in pot, because the vowel sounds following the "p" in each word are different.This phenomenon is known as ______.

A)phonemic restoration
B)formant formation
C)coarticulation
D)the McGurk effect

Question 13

Eimas and Corbit (1973) did an experiment in which they presented listeners with sounds in which the voicing varied from 0 ms up to 80 ms for "ta" and "da." At 0 ms, listeners heard the sound as "da," and at 80 ms, listeners heard the sound as "ta." Eimas and Corbit were interested in what listeners would hear when intermediate voicings were presented (e.g., 20-, 40-, and 60-ms voice-onset times).They found that listeners ______.

A)continued to hear whatever sound that they heard first
B)reported that the intermediate voicings sounded like "ga"
C)switched from hearing one sound to the other at around 35-ms voice-onset time
D)were inconsistent about whether they heard "ta" or "da" between 40-ms and 55-ms voice onset time

Question 14

Speech sounds made with restricted airflow are known as ______.

A)vowels
B)consonants
C)formants
D)harmonics

Question 15

An illusion in which participants hear sounds that are masked by white noise, but context makes the missing sound apparent, is known as ______.

A)word segmentation
B)the McGurk effect
C)the Krantz effect
D)the phonemic restoration effect

Question 16

Whether the vocal chords are vibrating or not is referred to as ______.

A)the vibration coefficient
B)voicing
C)coarticulation
D)speech onset equivalency

Question 17

The tube bringing air to and from the mouth is known as the ______.

A)fallopian tube
B)Eustachian tube
C)trachea
D)resonance chamber

Question 18

The perception of different acoustic stimuli as being identical phonemes up to a point at which perception flips to perceive another phoneme is known as ______.

A)the McGurk effect
B)coarticulation
C)speech resonance theory
D)categorical perception

Question 19

The ability of speakers of a language to correctly perceive boundaries between words is known as ______.

A)phonemic restoration
B)formant formation
C)lexical synching
D)word segmentation

Question 20

The point along the vocal tract at which the airflow is constricted, such as the lips, teeth, and structures along the back of the mouth, is known as ______.

A)a formant
B)the place of articulation
C)the uvulac tract
D)a voicing constant

Question 21

______ is an important area in the production of speech that is located in the left frontal lobe.

A)Wernicke's area
B)McGurk's area
C)Brodmann area 22
D)Broca's area

Question 22

Mattys, Barden, and Samuel (2014) had people simultaneously perform a listening task and a secondary visual task.As the secondary task became more difficult, ______.

A)there was an attenuation of the McGurk effect
B)the phonemic restoration effect grew stronger
C)participants found it increasingly hard to understand what they were hearing
D)the impact of coarticulation on the participants became more pronounced

Question 23

You want to convince your colleagues that there is a special mechanism underlying speech recognition, not a general mechanism.To do so, you could cite research into how ______ of the brain responds to the sounds of human speech.

A)the voice area
B)Pasley's area
C)Wernicke's area
D)Broca's area

Question 24

The theory that the core of speech perception is that the system infers the sound from the movements of the vocal tract is known as the ______ theory of speech perception.

A)perceptual-narrowing
B)motor
C)general-mechanism
D)private-access

Question 25

An area located in the superior temporal sulcus that responds to the sound of the human voice, but less so to other stimuli, is known as the ______.

A)voice area
B)phonemic restoration area
C)pharynx
D)speech recognition gyrus

Question 26

Patient MC speaks fluently, but he often produces words that make no sense.He has extreme difficulties understanding others' speech, especially when he cannot see their face.Your diagnosis?

A)Fowler's aphasia
B)Broca's aphasia
C)Wernicke's aphasia
D)phonemic agnosia

Question 27

An impairment in language production or comprehension brought about by neurological damage is known as ______.

A)phonological amnesia
B)anosoagnosia
C)aphasia
D)perceptual narrowing

Question 28

Sunami et al.(2013) used magnetoencephalography to examine the neurological correlates of the phonemic restoration effect.They found that ______.

A)just prior to the onset of a sentence, areas in the occipital lobe appeared primed for auditory input
B)areas in the left prefrontal lobe responded more strongly to context for missing sounds than for sounds that were actually present
C)immediately after the phonemic restoration effect occurred, strong signals came from the inferior colliculus alerting the person to the possible illusion
D)there were no differences between stimuli without a masked sound and those with a masked sound

Question 29

Imagine that you are conducting research into speech perception.You have just conducted an experiment in which participants watched you saying monosyllabic sounds while the participants listened to someone else's voice over headphones.The voice they were listening to sometimes matched the sounds that you were saying, but sometimes the voice over the headphones did not match what you were saying.Your participants reported hearing the sounds that they saw you utter, even when the voice in the headphones did not match what you were actually saying.Your results provide support for a ______ theory of speech perception.

A)general-mechanism
B)phoneme
C)motor
D)special-mechanism

Question 30

In the motor theory of speech perception, it is thought that ______.

A)unless one's own speech apparatus is engaged, it is impossible to understand the speech of others
B)areas in the premotor cortex are necessary for speech perception
C)inferring sound from the movements of the speaker's mouth is the core of the speech perception system
D)speech perception relies on the same processes as do other forms of auditory perception

Question 31

An important area in speech comprehension located in the left temporal lobe is called ______.

A)Broca's area
B)the voice area
C)Wernicke's area
D)the inferotemporal cortex

Question 32

Maurer and Werker (2014) compared infants and adults in their perceptions of the two ways of saying the "t" sound in Hindi.Hindi speakers recognize the difference between these two sounds.To English-speaking adults, however, they both sound like "t," and the adults do not hear the difference.The researchers found that ______.

A)English-learning infants were not able to discriminate between the two "t" sounds because of prenatal exposure to English
B)Hindi-learning babies did not learn the distinction between the two "t" sounds until they were capable of their own speech
C)there were no differences between the English- and Hindi-learning babies until they reached roughly 18 months of age
D)both sets of babies could reliably distinguish the two "t" sounds at 6 months of age, but at 10 months of age only the Hindi-learning babies could do so

Question 33

The case study of Genie, an individual who grew up in extreme isolation, demonstrates that ______.

A)people lose their speech learning abilities by the time they reach adolescence, unless they are stimulated early in life
B)speech learning ability is more or less unchanged throughout one's lifespan
C)speech learning is effectively impossible for someone whose early development took place in isolation
D)early development is crucial for speech learning, but some speech learning abilities persist into later life

Question 34

As infants get older, they focus their attention on stimuli that are relevant to them, rather than attending to all stimuli out there.This is advantageous in learning one's first language, though it makes it more difficult to acquire a native-sounding accent in a second language later on.This idea is most associated with which phenomenon?

A)the phonemic restoration effect
B)Hindi-English lexical equivalency
C)perceptual narrowing
D)the motor theory of speech perception

Question 35

The developmental process whereby regularly experienced phonemes are homed in on, with simultaneous diminishing of the ability to discriminate unfamiliar phonemes, is known as ______.

A)perceptual narrowing
B)developmental aphasia
C)phonemic learning
D)categorical perception

Question 36

The general scientific principle that simpler theories should be preferred over complex theories unless there is compelling evidence to support a more complex theory leads scientists to favor ______ theories of speech perception.

A)special-mechanism
B)general-mechanism
C)motor
D)perceptual narrowing

Question 37

An experimenter uses a computer to delete or mask a particular sound in a sentence in which the context clearly indicates what the missing sound should be.The experimenter then plays the sentence for participants and asks them what they just heard.The result is that the participants report ______.

A)being unable to understand the word that has one of its sounds masked
B)noticing that a sound is missing and correctly inferring what that sound is
C)hearing an unvoiced consonant in place of the masked sound
D)hearing the masked sound correctly, even though it is not actually present

Question 38

Patient RW has non-fluent speech.She is able to say just a few words, mostly nouns.However, she understands speech without any difficulties and can shake her head yes or no correctly in response to most questions.What is your diagnosis?

A)Broca's aphasia
B)Wernicke's aphasia
C)Fowler's aphasia
D)phonemic agnosia

Question 39

In a study by Holt (2005), participants listened to speech sounds, such as "ga" or "da," that were preceded by series of non-speech sounds.The research found that ______.

A)the more non-speech sounds that were presented, the more likely the "ga" or "da" sound was to be heard as speech
B)the more non-speech sounds that were presented, the more likely that participants heard illusory distracting noise
C)the patterns of the non-speech sounds influenced whether participants perceived the speech sounds correctly
D)the number and pattern of non-speech sounds did not influence how participants perceived the speech sounds

Question 40

General-mechanism theories of speech perception claim that ______.

A)the same mechanisms used to perceive speech are also used to process visual stimuli
B)we can process speech most effectively when we are able to see the speaker's mouth movements
C)the mechanisms for speech perception are the same as the mechanisms used for all auditory perception
D)understanding speech relies on mechanisms that are specific to that task

Question 41

Explain the differences in how we produce vowels, voiced consonants, and unvoiced consonants.

Question 42

Even people who show no threshold differences to normal when wearing hearing aids may still show deficits in speech perception.

Question 43

Bính is a man who is fluent in both English and Vietnamese.He has a hearing impairment and uses a hearing aid.Of the two languages he knows, Bính finds it harder to understand people who are speaking ______ because his hearing aid does a relatively poor job of conveying ______.

A)English; structure
B)Vietnamese; word segmentation
C)English; tone
D)Vietnamese; pitch

Question 44

You have been assigned to assist in the treatment of KW, a right-handed 32-year-old male who is recovering from a motorcycle accident.The accident resulted in moderate damage to the left frontal lobe of KW's brain.The rest of KW's brain did not suffer major injury.What effects is KW likely to experience as a result of this brain damage, and what diagnosis would you provide?

Question 45

Which of the following tends to be the most problematic for hearing-impaired people who use hearing aids?

A)difficulty comprehending speech
B)inadequate amplification of sounds
C)difficulty in hearing background sounds
D)loss of interest in music

Question 46

Give an example of how knowledge about language affects how we perceive speech.Be sure to explain what processes are involved in your example.

Question 47

In the phonemic restoration effect, participants hear sounds that are masked by white noise, but context causes people to believe they have actually heard the missing sound.

Question 48

General-mechanism theories of speech perception claim that the mechanisms for speech perception are distinct and unique relative to the mechanisms for auditory perception in general.

Question 49

Perceptual narrowing is the process that makes it difficult for adults to learn to speak a second language without an accent.

Question 50

Pasley et al.(2012) recruited patients who were soon to undergo surgery on their temporal lobes as a treatment for epilepsy or brain tumors.While outfitted with intracranial electrodes that were actively recording brain activity, the patients heard recordings of words and sentences from a variety of speakers.The researchers found that ______.

A)the brain activity of speakers talking in their native languages differed from the activity of speakers using languages they were not fluent in
B)during an epileptic fit, there was no EEG emanating from auditory regions of the brain
C)a computer could use the activity they detected in the auditory cortex to recreate many of the auditory signals the patients were hearing
D)speech by people whose voices were familiar to the patients was processed differently than that of unfamiliar speakers

Question 51

SELECT ALL THAT APPLY.Which of the following is important in the formation of consonants?
a.voicing
b.manner of articulation
c.vocal fry
d.place of articulation

Question 52

Broca's area is an important area in speech comprehension, located in the left frontal lobe.

Question 53

The average speaker may talk at a rate of roughly one word every 50 ms.

Question 54

Coarticulation is the phenomenon in which one phoneme affects the acoustic properties of subsequent phonemes.

Question 55

Contrast the evidence that supports general-mechanism theories of speech perception with the evidence that supports special-mechanism theories, and give examples of at least one experiment that supports each type of theory.

Question 56

Formants are frequency bands with higher amplitudes among the harmonics of a vowel sound; each individual vowel sound has a specific pattern of formants.

Question 57

In the McGurk effect, when people are exposed to speech sounds that do not match the mouth movements they see in a video, they nevertheless report seeing mouth movements that are consistent with the sounds they heard.

Question 58

Dylan and Yasmin were both born and raised in Toledo, Ohio.Dylan grew up in a monolingual household and speaks only English.Yasmin grew up in a household where English and Spanish were spoken regularly, and she is bilingual.Compare how and why Dylan and Yasmin are likely to differ in their ability to perceive phonemes.

Question 59

Vowels are speech sounds made with restricted airflow, whereas consonants are speech sounds made with unrestricted airflow.

Question 60

Sign language speakers with brain damage to Wernicke's area will show ______.

A)no changes because Wernicke's area is used only for spoken speech
B)an impaired ability to interpret emotional expressions
C)an impaired ability to understand sign language
D)a heightened awareness of auditory stimuli