Statistical learning, cross-linguistic constraints, and the acquisition of speech categories

Posted on 1 Nov 2005 by Joe Toscano

A computational approach

Toscano, J. C. and McMurray, B. (2005, November). Paper presented at the 11th Midcontinental Workshop on Phonology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI.

Abstract:

Infants learning the phonetic categories of their native language must recognize which distinctions are relevant to their language and which are not. While they initially discriminate both native and non-native phoneme contrasts, infants quickly learn to discriminate only those contrasts that are present in their language (Werker & Tees, 1984), and eventually form language-appropriate phonetic categories... Read more →

Tagged with: computational modeling, cross-linguistic constraints, gaussian mixture models, language acquisition, speech development
Posted in Presentations

Computational models of speech perception

Posted on 1 Jan 2003 by Joe Toscano

By building computer models of the speech system and running simulations with them, we are able to better understand how phonetic categories are learned and how listeners process speech sounds during word recognition. I use several types of models to study speech perception, including neural network and statistical models. Two of the specific problems I am working on are unsupervised learning and cue weighting... Read more →

Tagged with: computational modeling, cue integration, cue weighting, research, speech development, statistical learning, unsupervised learning, voice onset time
Posted in Research

Joe Toscano

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Statistical learning, cross-linguistic constraints, and the acquisition of speech categories

A computational approach

Computational models of speech perception