• Journal of KIISE:Databases
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• v.30 no.5
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• pp.507-520
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• 2003

In this paper, an automatic construction method of theme melody index for large music database and an associative content-based music retrieval mechanism in which the constructed theme melody index is mainly used to improve the users' response time are proposed. First, the system automatically extracted the theme melody from a music file by the graphical clustering algorithm based on the similarities between motifs of the music. To place an extracted theme melody into the metric space of M-tree, we chose the average length variation and the average pitch variation of the theme melody as the major features. Moreover, we added the pitch signature and length signature which summarize the pitch variation pattern and the length variation pattern of a theme melody, respectively, to increase the precision of retrieval results. We also proposed the associative content-based music retrieval mechanism in which the k-nearest neighborhood searching and the range searching algorithms of M-tree are used to select the similar melodies to user's query melody from the theme melody index. To improve the users' satisfaction, the proposed retrieval mechanism includes ranking and user's relevance feedback functions. Also, we implemented the proposed mechanisms as the essential components of content-based music retrieval systems to verify the usefulness.

• Journal of Music and Human Behavior
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.19-36
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• 2015

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of rhythmic auditory stimulation (RAS) on gait parameters, with and without the presence of a melody, for adolescents with traumatic brain injury (TBI). Three adolescents with TBI received a total of ten individual RAS training sessions. At pre and posttest, spatiotemporal parameters including cadence, velocity and kinematic parameters were measured using the VICON 370 Motion Analysis System. The results showed no significant difference in gait velocity between the two conditions, thus the presence of the melody condition did not impact the outcome of RAS gait training. On the other hand, all participants showed improvement in gait function after RAS training. The cadence, velocity, stride length, and symmetry were increased and the stride time was reduced after training. The motion analysis demonstrated that the movement patterns of hip and knee joints improved, as they were more similar to normal gait, which indicates that the walkings tance became more stable. The research findings indicate that rhythm is the primary factor in mediating gait functions via RAS training. This study also supports that RAS training can effectively improve the gait function for adolescents with TBI.

• Journal of Music and Human Behavior
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.1-18
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• 2017

The relationships between the ability to understand changes in meaning depending on the prosody of spoken words and the ability to perceive pitch and melodic contour in cochlear implants (CI) recipients were examined. Fifteen postlingual CI recipients were measured in terms of speech prosody perception, speech perception, pitch discrimination (PD), and melody contour identification (MCI). The speech prosody perception test consists of words with positive (PW) and neutral meaning (NW). Participants were asked to identify the meaning of words depending on the conditions of positive and negative prosody. The MCI consists of subtests 1 and 2 with different chance levels to choose. Then, the relationships between speech prosody perception, speech perception, PD, and MCI performance were analyzed. There was a significant difference in identifying the meaning of words expressed in a different prosody between the PW and NW conditions. Speech prosody perception showed a significant correlation with MCI 1 while there was no significant relationship with speech perception. Although speech perception may be possible after CI, limited spoken word comprehension due to decreased sensitivity for prosodic changes may persist in CI recipients. In addition, there was a limitation in perception of melodic contour change compared to pitch discrimination, which is related to speech prosody perception.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.75-83
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• 2020

The purpose of this study was to examine how a singing program using self-voice monitoring for children with cochlear implants (CI) influences on the intonation and the accuracy of pitch production. To verify and estimate the effectiveness, a program was conducted with participants of 7 prelingual CI users, whose aged between 4 years and 7 years. The program adopted three stages from the self-voice monitoring: Listen, Explore, and Reproduce (LER stage). All participants received 8 singing sessions over 8 weeks, including pre-test, intervention, and post-test. For the pre and post-test, participants' singing of an excerpt of a song "happy birthday" and speaking three assertive sentences and three interrogative sentences were recorded and analyzed in terms of the intonation slopes at the end of the sentences and the melodic contour. From the sentence speeches, we found that the intonation slopes of the interrogative sentences significantly improved as they showed similar patterns with that of the average normal hearing group. Also, in regard to singing, we observed that the melody contour had progressed, as well as the range of pitch production had extended. The positive result from the intervention indicates that the singing program was effective for children with CI to develop the intonation skill and accuracy of pitch production.