• Korean Journal of English Language and Linguistics
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• v.3 no.3
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• pp.427-452
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• 2003

Korean is famous for having all voiceless stop sounds. Korean does have voiced stops but they are considered to exist only as the allophones of word initial /p, t, k/. My experiment shows the English word initial stop sounds [b, d, g] and the Korean lax stop series /p, t, k/ in word initial position are similar in the range of voice onset time. If English word initial[b, d, g] sounds are posited as voiced, then Korean word initial /p, t, k/ should be classified as voiced also. Phonetically English /b, d, g/ phonemes and Korean /p, t, k/ phonemes are very similar except the word initial [p, t, k] are devoiced slightly more, but not significant enough to be classified as voiceless than English word initial [b, d, g]. If we posit /b, d, g/ as Korean phonemes, it explains why Korean /p, t, k/ series has the allophones [b, d, g] instead of fortis stops /p', t', k'/ in Korean even though /p', t', k'/ has less positive VOT value than /p, t, k/. If we posit /b, d, g/ as Korean phonemes, then it does not cause spelling or pronunciation confusion either when Koreans learn English or English speakers learn Korean.

• Proceedings of the KSPS conference
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• 2000.07a
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• pp.199-199
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• 2000

Korean stops are 3 system: aspirated, fortis, lenis, whereas English stops are 2 system: voiced, voiceless. Because in Korean, lenis stop is realized by slight aspirated voiceless stop, it is likely to produce English word initial voiced stop as voiceless stop. We divide subjects into three group-native, experienced, unexperienced- and investigate differences between group. VOT of experienced group IS same as native group, but VOT of unexperienced group is longer than native group. VOt of unexperienced group is 1.8 times than native group. We survey whether the height of following vowel influences VOT of initial stop. As a result, for all group, VOT followed by low vowel is shorter than VOT followed by high vowel. But this tendency is more salient in unexperienced group. For high vowel, VOT of unexperienced group is 2.05 times than native group, whereas for low vowel, it is just 1.55 times. The unexperienced pronounce well English word initial voiced stop followed by low vowel than high vowel. Samples are divided into two group according to type of coda consonant- nasal and voiceless stop. But average of VOT is similar and there is no significant difference between two groups. There is no influence by type of coda consonant. The average of phrases is compared to the average of isolated words. In the case of natives and experienced, there is no significant differences between phrases and words, but in the case of unexperienced, VOT of phrases becomes shorter than words. But VOT of unexperienced is still longer than native group.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.3 no.4
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• pp.71-81
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• 2011

This paper investigated how prosodic position and word type affect the phonetic structure of Korean coronal stops. Initial segments of prosodic domains were known to be more strongly articulated and longer relative to prosodic domain-medial segments. However, there are few studies examining whether the properties of prosodic domain-initial segments are affected by the information content of words (real vs. nonsense words). In addition, since the scope of domain-initial effect was known to be local to the initial consonant and the effects on the following vowel have been found to be limited, it is thus worth examining whether the prosodic domain-initial effect extends into the vowel after the initial consonant in a systematic way across different prosodic domains. The acoustic properties of Korean coronal stops (lenis /t/, aspirated /$t^h$/, and tense /t'/) were compared across Intonational Phrase, Phonological Phrase and Word-initial positions both in real and nonsense words. The durational intervals such as VOT and CV duration were cumulatively lengthened for /t/ and /$t^h$/ in the higher prosodic domain-initial positions. However, tense stop /t'/ did not show any variation as a function of prosodic position and word type. The domain-initial lenis stop showed significantly longer duration in nonsense words than in real words. But the prosodic domain-initial effect was not found in the properties of F0 and [H1-H2] of the vowel after initial stops. The present study provided evidence that speakers tend to enhance speech clarity when there is less contextual information as in prosodic domain-initial position and in nonsense words.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.53-64
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• 2021

It is known that the voicing contrast for Japanese word-initial stops is primarily realized as differences in the voice onset time (VOT). However, recent studies have reported that voiced stops are more often produced with a positive VOT than with a negative VOT among the younger generation nationwide. It is also known that post-stop F0 is associated with the stop contrast, but the degree of F0 use differs from region to region. This study explores whether the difference in post-stop F0 functions as a perceptual cue to the stop contrast along with VOT. Fifty-five college students who are native listeners from four different regions participated in two or three perception tests. The results show that VOT is a primary cue to the voiced-voiceless distinction of word-initial stops, but that the effect of post-stop F0 on the stop contrast is marginal. The post-stop F0 is involved in perception only when VOT is ambiguous, such that a sound with high F0 is more often perceived as a voiceless stop, but not vice versa. The results of this study indicate that the acoustic parameters associated with the stop contrast are not the same in production and perception, and suggest that other factors such as context, which is not an acoustic characteristic, may also be involved in the stop contrast.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.5 no.3
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• pp.31-38
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• 2013

This study investigated the influence of English vowel pronunciation training to English word-initial stop pronunciation. For that purpose, VOT values of English stops produced by twenty Korean English learners(five Youngnam dialect male speakers, five Youngnam dialect female speakers, five Kangwon dialect male speakers, and five Kangwon dialect female speakers) were measured using the Speech Analyzer and their post-training production was compared with their pre-training production. The result shows that post-training VOT values of voiced stops became closer to those of native English speakers in all four groups. Hence, it can be inferred that vowel pronunciation training is effective for correcting pronunciation of voiced vowels by analyzing the change of the quality of following vowels(especially low vowels) and the degree of giving stress.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.57-61
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• 2020

Previous research has indicated that the patterns of phonetic modulations induced by prominence are not consistent across languages but are conditioned by sound systems specific to a given language. Most studies examining the prominence effects in Korean have been restricted to segments in word-initial and phrase-initial positions. The present study, thus, set out to explore the prominence effects for Korean stop consonants in word-medial intervocalic positions. A total of 16 speakers of Seoul Korean (8 males, 8 females) produced word-medial intervocalic lenis and aspirated stops with and without prominence. The prominence was induced by contrast focus on the phonation-type contrast, that is, lenis vs. aspirated stops. Our results showed that F0 of vowels following both lenis and aspirated stops became higher when the target stops received focus than when they did not, whereas voice onset time (VOT) and voicing during stop closure for both lenis and aspirated stops did not differ between the focus and no-focus conditions. The findings add to our understanding of diverse patterns of prominence-induced strengthening on the acoustic realizations of segments.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.19-28
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• 2015

This study investigated final consonant error characteristics at word-medial position in children with functional articulation disorder. Data was collected from 11 children with functional articulation and 11 normal children, ages 4 to 5. The speech samples were collected from a naming test. Seventy-five words with every possible bi-consonants matrix at the word-medial position were used. The results of this study were as follows : First, percentage of correct word-medial final consonants of functional articulation disorder was lower than normal children. Second, there were significant differences between two groups in omission, substitution and assimilation error. Children with functional articulation disorder showed a high frequency of omission and regressive assimilation error, especially alveolarization in regressive assimilation error most. However, normal children showed a high frequency of regressive assimilation error, especially bilabialization in regressive assimilation error most. Finally, the results of error analysis according to articulation manner, articulation place and phonation type of consonants of initial consonant at word-medial, both functional articulation disorder and normal children showed a high error rate in stop sound-stop sound condition. The error rate of final consonant at word-medial position was high when initial consonant at word-medial position was alveolar sound and alveopalatal sound. Futhermore, when initial sounds were fortis and aspirated sounds, more errors occurred than linis sound was initial sound. The results of this study provided practical error characteristics of final consonant at word-medial position in children with speech sound disorder.

• MALSORI
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• no.38
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• pp.125-136
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• 1999

This study examined the perception and production of Korean lax, fortis and aspirated stops in three apraxic patients. All of tile subjects made more production errors than perception errors. This indicates that apraxic patients have problems in phonetic execution rather than phonological representation. Additionally, in both production and perception, there were more errors in non-word-initial consonants than in word-initial consonants. These findings contradict those of the previous studies which report more errors in word-initial consonants. This study also found that, unlike previous studies in the types of errors made, distortion errors were high in both non-word-initial and word-initial consonants in apraxic patients. Generally, VOT of the stops showed significant differences among lax, fortis, and aspirated stops, which indicates that there is a failure not in choosing the appropriate stop but in positioning or motor planning at the articulation stage.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.5 no.3
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• pp.73-81
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• 2013

Coda in the word-medial position plays an important role in acquisition of our speech. Accuracy of the coda in the word-medial position is important as a diagnostic indicator since it has a close relationship with degrees of disorder. Coda in the word-medial position only appears in condition of connecting two vowels and the sequence causes diverse phonological processes to happen. The coda in the word-medial position differs in production difficulty by the initial sound in the sequence. Accordingly, this study aims to examine the tendency of producing a coda in the word-medial position with consideration of an optional phonological process in spontaneous speech of three and four year old children. Data was collected from 24 children (four groups by age) without speech and language delay. The results of the study are as follows: 1) Sonorant coda in the word-medial position showed a high production frequency in manner of articulation, and alveolar in place of articulation. When the coda in the word-medial position is connected to an initial sound in the same place of articulation, it revealed a high frequency of production. 2) The coda in word-medial position followed by an initial alveolar stop revealed a high error rate. Error patterns showed regressive assimilation predominantly. 3) The order of difficulty that Children had producing codas in the word-medial position was $/k^{\neg}/$, $/p^{\neg}/$, /m/, /n/, /ŋ/ and /l/. Those results suggest that in targeting coda in the word-medial position for evaluation, we should consider optional phonological process as well as the following initial sound. Further studies would be necessary which codas in the word-medial position will be used for therapeutic purpose.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.43-54
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• 2006

The purpose of this study is to examine temporal structures of English words beginning with an /s/ plus stop sequence through production experiments with native speakers of Korean learning English and native speakers of English. According to the results of our production experiment, both a beginner and an advanced group of Korean English learners produced /s/ shorter than a following stop, while the opposite pattern was observed in English native speakers' production. An advanced group of Korean English learners were good at producing a stop after /s/ as unaspirated, but their production of a stop following /s/ was different from English native speakers' production in that the closure duration of the stop was much longer.