Acoustic Analysis of Fricatives /s/ and /ʃ/ and Affricate /ʧ/ in Persian-Speaking Cochlear-Implanted Children and Normal-Hearing Peers

Rahimeh Roohparvar; Mahin Karimabadi; Shima Ghahari; Mogaddameh Mirzaee

doi:10.18502/avr.v33i3.15504

Rahimeh Roohparvar Department of Foreign Languages, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, Shahid Bahonar University of Kerman, Kerman, Iran
Mahin Karimabadi Department of Foreign Languages, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, Shahid Bahonar University of Kerman, Kerman, Iran
Shima Ghahari Department of Foreign Languages, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, Shahid Bahonar University of Kerman, Kerman, Iran
Mogaddameh Mirzaee Modeling in Health Research Center, Institute for Futures Studies in Health, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran

DOI: https://doi.org/10.18502/avr.v33i3.15504

Abstract

Background and Aim: Hearing-impaired individuals have difficulty comprehending and producing speech sounds. Cochlear implantation is used to augment hearing. The present study aims to compare the production of fricatives /s/ and /ʃ/ and affricate /ʧ/ by Persian- speaking Cochlear-Implanted (CI) and Normal-Hearing (NH) children

Methods: Fifteen Persian-speaking NH children and 15 Persian-speaking CI children, matched for age, gender, and general health conditions, were included in the study. The stimuli included two voiceless Persian fricatives /s/ and /ʃ/ and one voiceless Persian affricate

/ʧ/ along with the open front vowel /æ/ in three Consonant-Vowel (CV), Consonant-Vowel- Consonant (CVC), and Vowel-Consonant (VC) contexts (/sæ/, /æsæ/, /æs/, /ʃæ/, /æʃæ/, /æʃ/,/ʧæ/, /æʧæ/, /æʧ/). After recording all utterances, Praat software was used to measure the friction duration, rise time, and spectral peak of the consonants

Results: The CI children could not distinguish between /ʃ/ and /ʧ/ and produced affricate

/ʧ/ as an allophone of /ʃ/ (p=0.01). Moreover, distinguishing between two fricatives /s/ and /ʃ/ was difficult for both groups. While NH children slightly treated these two sounds differently, the CI group produced fricative /s/ as an allophone of /ʃ/ (p=0.02). The rise time of /ʃ/ was longer in the NH children, except for /ʧæ/, where the CI children had a longer rise time.

Conclusion: The speech of CI children is different in producing /s/, /ʃ/, and /ʧ/ from their NH peers. The results can help speech therapists, clinical linguists, and application designers focus on speech sounds that are challenging for CI children to produce.

Keywords: Cochlear implant; speech production; fricatives; affricate