Abstract
The purpose of this study is to find some acoustic parameters on frequency domain to distinguish the Korean nasals, $/m,\;n,\;{\eta}/$ from each other. The new parameters are devised on the basis of LTAS (Long Term Average Spectrum). The maximum peak amplitude and the relevant formant frequency are measured in low and high frequency range, respectively. The frequency of spectral valley and its energy level are also obtained in the specific frequency range of the spectrum. Spectral slope, total energy value in specific frequency range, statistical distribution of spectral energy like centroid, skewness, and kurtosis are suggested as new parameters as well. The parameters that show statistically significant differences across nasals are summerized as follows. 1) in syllable initial positions: the total energy value from 1,500 to 2,200 Hz(zeroENG); 2) in syllable final positions: the peak amplitude of the first formant(peak1_a), the formant frequency with maximum peak amplitude from 4,000 to 8,000 Hz(peak2_f), the maximum peak amplitude of the formant frequency from 4,000 to 8,000 Hz(peak2_a), and the total energy value from 1,500 to 2,200 Hz(zeroENG).