Fundamental frequency characteristics of esophageal and tracheoesophageal speech of Cantonese during speech and non-speech tasks

Abstract

The study investigated the fundamental frequency (F0) from standard esophageal (SE) and tracheoesophageal (TE) speakers of Cantonese in speech and non-speech tasks, and compared the result with normal laryngeal (NL) speakers when they share different speech and air reservoir mechanism. 10 speakers in each group performed spontaneous speech and standard passage reading in speech tasks, and pitch scaling in non-speech tasks. PRAAT was used in F0 extraction. 1 SE data was excluded due to failure of F0 extraction. Results showed all speaker groups produced significantly higher mean F0 in pitch scaling than spontaneous speech task. Significant differences between SE, TE and NL speakers were only observed in pitch scaling task. Result suggested SE and TE speakers with good speech proficiency could produce a F0 higher than habitual speaking F0, which suggested prosody training in future vocal rehabilitation.