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Show 39 college of humanities The purpose of this investigation is to add to the current literature regarding normative nasalance values for speakers from Utah dialectical backgrounds. Nasalance is an objective speech measure that relates to the perception of nasality in speech, and refers to the ratio of nasal to oral sound pressure level. Factors such as dialectical and linguistic background may influence speech and voice characteristics, like nasalance. As part of a multicenter study, we are attempting to establish normal nasalance values for Utah as com-pared to different parts of the country. Utah is one of 5 participating locations across the United States and Canada. At the University of Utah site, 50 participants (25 males and 25 females) will be recruited along with ap-proximately 200 participants from the other geographic locations. To date, we have collected data from approximately two thirds of our target number of participants. Data collection procedures include a basic hearing screening and nasalance acquisition using the Nasometer II 6400. The Nasometer II 6400 automati-cally measures the nasalance associated with specific phonetic contexts to establish a normative database. Although data collection is not yet complete for this site, differences in the mean nasalance values have been observed for each passage read by participants. Mean percent nasalance was 32% for the Rainbow Passage (which includes a mix of nasal and non-nasal consonants), 10% for the Zoo Passage (which in-cludes no nasal consonants), and 62% for the Nasal Passage (loaded with nasal consonants). These patterns are consistent with normative data previously acquired from the Mid-Western United States and Central Canada. After data collection and analysis has been completed for Utah, these data will then be compared to the other locations. Differences between dialects and nasalance percentages from the different sites' data are expected. NASALANCE IN UTAH SPEAKERS: A NORMATIVE STUDY Jessica Gordon (Nelson Roy) Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders University of Utah UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH ABSTRACTS Nelson Roy Jessica Gordon |
