A sensorimotor basis of speech communication

This dissertation presents the development of sensorimotor primitives as a means of constructing a language-agnostic model of speech communication. Insights from major theories in speech science and linguistics are used to develop a conceptual framework for sensorimotor primitives in the context of control and information theory. Within this conceptual framework, sensorimotor primitives are defined as a system transformation that simplifies the interface to some high dimensional and/or nonlinear system. In the context of feedback control, sensorimotor primitives take the form of a feedback transformation. In the context of communication, sensorimotor primitives are represented as a channel encoder and decoder pair. Using a high fidelity simulation of articulatory speech synthesis, these realizations of sensorimotor primitives are respectively applied to feedback control of the articulators, and communication via the acoustic speech signal. Experimental results demonstrate the construction of a model of speech communication that is capable of both transmitting and receiving information, and imitating simple utterances.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Electrical & Computer Engr

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2019

Author dc:creator

• Bryan, Jacob

Contributors dc:contributor

• Levinson, Stephen E.
• Hasegawa-Johnson, Mark
• Shosted, Ryan K.
• Varshney, Lav R.

• speech
• langauge
• artificial intelligence
• speech signal processing
• speech communication
• speech articulation
• sensorimotor primitives
• speech primitives
• variational autoencoder
• inverse channel encoder

Statement dc:rights

• © 2019 Jacob D. Bryan

Language dc:language

en

Handle dc:identifier

http://hdl.handle.net/2142/104777

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/104777