Speech Motor Control

Speaking is one of the most complex skills that humans perform. This volume presents state of the art research in the science of speech motor control and speech disorders. This will be an important volume for all those involved in speech research and speech pathology, including those from the disciplines of psychology, neurology, and ENT.

This book presents the latest theoretical developments in the area of speech motor control, offering new insights by leading scientists and clinicians into speech disorders. The scope of this book is broad, presenting research in the areas of modelling, genetics, brain imaging, behavioral experimentation, and clinical applications.

Wenner-Gren Center International Symposium Series, Volume 36: Speech Motor Control covers the papers presented at an interdisciplinary conference on Speech Motor Control, held at the Wenner-Gren Center in Stockholm on May 11 to 12, 1981. The book focuses on the methodologies, approaches, processes, and techniques employed in speech motor control. The selection first offers information on the interdisciplinary challenge of speech motor control and analogies between central motor programs for speech and for limb movements. Discussions focus on regulation of cerebral motor cortex output by afferent input, goal-orientation and voluntary movement, interaction of transcortical and segmental reflexes, plasticity of speech gestures, and the task of the speech motor system. The text then takes a look at speech production mechanisms in aphasia and functional landscapes in the cerebral cortex related to speech, as well as motor errors and phonetic transcription studies and correlational analysis of consonant preferences in infants, languages, and aphasic errors. The publication ponders on functional landscapes in the cerebral cortex related to speech; comment on the partial roles of the cerebral hemispheres for speech; and speech breathing kinematics and mechanism inferences. The text also ponders on the aspects of voice production and motor control, vocal fold kinesiology, and oral mechanoreceptors. The text is a dependable reference for readers interested in speech motor control.

A comprehensive and unified account of the neural computations underlying speech production, offering a theoretical framework bridging the behavioral and the neurological literatures. In this book, Frank Guenther offers a comprehensive, unified account of the neural computations underlying speech production, with an emphasis on speech motor control rather than linguistic content. Guenther focuses on the brain mechanisms responsible for commanding the musculature of the vocal tract to produce articulations that result in an acoustic signal conveying a desired string of syllables. Guenther provides neuroanatomical and neurophysiological descriptions of the primary brain structures involved in speech production, looking particularly at the cerebral cortex and its interactions with the cerebellum and basal ganglia, using basic concepts of control theory (accompanied by nontechnical explanations) to explore the computations performed by these brain regions. Guenther offers a detailed theoretical framework to account for a broad range of both behavioral and neurological data on the production of speech. He discusses such topics as the goals of the neural controller of speech; neural mechanisms involved in producing both short and long utterances; and disorders of the speech system, including apraxia of speech and stuttering. Offering a bridge between the neurological and behavioral literatures on speech production, the book will be a valuable resource for researchers in both fields.

This book explores the nature of cognitive representations and processes in speech motor control, based primarily on evidence from speech timing. It engages with the key question of whether phonological representations are spatio-temporal, as in the Articulatory Phonology approach, or symbolic (atemporal and non-quantitative); this issue has fundamental implications for the architecture of the speech production planning system, particularly with regard to the number of planning components and the type of timing mechanisms. Alice Turk and Stefanie Shattuck-Hufnagel outline a number of arguments in favour of an alternative to the Articulatory Phonology/Task Dynamics model. They demonstrate that a different framework is needed to account for evidence from speech and non-speech timing behaviour, and specifically that three separate planning components must be posited: Phonological Planning, Phonetic Planning, and Motor-Sensory Implementation. The approach proposed in the book provides a clearer and more comprehensive account of what is known about motor timing in general and speech timing in particular. It will be of interest to phoneticians and phonologists from all theoretical backgrounds as well as to speech clinicians and technologists.

This book presents a comprehensive, state-of-the-art picture of theory and research in speech motor control related to stuttering. The principle theories of speech production are discussed by leading authors, and new explanations for stuttering based on these theories are presented. Sections on research in stuttering and its neurological correlates are also included. Special attention is devoted to the clinical application of research findings. In addition, a broad overview of research on stuttering children is presented.