Phonatory and articulatory correlates in kinematic neuromotor degeneration

Abstract

Degenerative neuromotor diseases, as Parkinson’s (PD) produce important correlates in phonation and articulation, which may be used in pathology monitoring and grading. The study is intended to describe how phonation and articulation correlates in simple exercises may be used to monitor PD. Specifically, phonation bursts, mandibular and lingual tremor, or velopharyngeal switch failures may be detected in formant spectrograms by estimating articulation kinematics from the first and second formants. Estimations of these correlates in PD patients and control subjects are compared to establish the statistical relevance of the methodology.