Acoustics MA 2010

TASK 5 - FINAL PROJECT

STUDENT ______________________________ 5-1 The topic and the questions
Choose a topic that you are REALLY interested in. That will make your work easier.

DATE ___________________

This project CAN be something you can enjoy.

You should first decide on the general area in which you would like to do some more

work segments or suprasegmentals? Vowels or consonants? Intonation? Some specific type of functions? Of course, you may choose a topic/ question that requires both segmental and suprasegmental investigation, but it is important to know what you generally prefer. Brainstorming. Think about the way people speak, try to remember specific people and specific situations. Try to remember the things that drew your attention regarding the way people spoke on certain occasions. Make notes while brainstorming. For instance 'I remember that Collin Nicholson sounded very interesting. I think it was something about his consonants'. Or 'In Grey's Anatomy everybody uses the same intonation all the time, that's really annoying'. Or 'My impression is that our new American lector is really shy. Could it be because of something in the way s/he speaks? Something about the intonation or prosody?' Or 'Why can't I understand Mr Peterson? I really try but it is difficult to understand his speech' And so on... Look at your notes and choose one or two things that you find the most interesting or intriguing. Don't forget that phonetic acoustic analysis can help us investigate questions that are not restricted to phonetics we can investigate sociolinguistic variation, differences in the way people speak that are related not only to their geographical background (dialects, accents), but also to their social and cultural background (social groups, subcultures...). We can investigate questions related to L2 learning and the speech of L2 learners, various aspects of their skills and their level of competence Ask questions. Try to come up with several specific questions about the topics you have chosen. Verbalize the questions. Try to make them as specific and clear as possible. For instance: What are the most important characteristics of British English (speech)? This may be a very interesting question, but it is not specific enough for the purpose or this project. It covers a very wide area and would be very difficult to answer. It would require an extensive study, many participants and a thorough examination of many phonetic cues, which you cannot do now. Try to focus on very specific and narrowly defined questions, such as: What are the differences (if any) in the vowel length and quality produced by an American speaker and a British speaker? This question is specific enough, focused and manageable. Spend some time trying to formulate a number of 'good', manageable questions. For instance: What phonetic cues does Mr X use to signal focus? How do Sonja and Brook differ in terms of using pitch range? Do advanced Serbian students of English make a difference between aspirated and unaspirated voiceless plosives?

Acoustics MA 2010 The question you finally choose for the project should be meaningful. It should be

meaningful in itself focusing on something worth finding out, and it should be meaningful for you focusing on something you really want to find out.

5-2 The methodology Thinking about your question will lead you to two important decisions you need to make now: First, whose speech you are going to investigate, i.e. who your study participant(s) will be, and Second, what 'speech style' you are going to investigate. The choice of the data gathering procedure is crucial, as you know, because each has both advantages and disadvantages, and we always need to think about the trade-off, the gains and the losses. Speaking - 'real' spontaneous speech: dialogue, monologue, public lecture, public speech; television, radio.... NB higher frequencies are often lost! Reading word lists (in isolation / in a carrier sentence); longer pieces of text (narrative / dialogue/ monologue)l; text genres, styles, registers, levels of formality; text structure Story-retelling semi-spontaneous speech; some level of control possible When making this decision, rely on the advice offered by Deterding (2006), Llisterri (1992), Ladefoged (2001) and other researchers. If you decide on a reading task, use a paragraph already used by previous researchers! e.g. A boy who cried 'Wolf!' Deterding 2006 If your question hasn't defined that already (for instance, if you have chosen to compare Sonja and Brook in some respect) now is the time to rephrase your question so as to include these two pieces of information. For instance: What are the differences (if any) in the vowel length and quality produced by an American speaker and a British speaker in a reading task/ illustrated by word lists / in a story-retelling task/ in reading a dialogue aloud.... etc.? OR What phonetic cues does Mr X use to signal focus in a list of isolated utterances / in reading a piece of text aloud/ in spontaneous speech/ a conversaton/ reading out a dialogue?

5-3 The procedures

Make a plan. Before you start the actual study, make a detailed plan of your steps

what you will do first, what second... Be as specific as possible about the details and the order of the steps you will take. Go through the whole study in your mind, from the beginning to the end, and try to anticipate the possible problems and difficulties. Think about the solutions, too :-)

Acoustics MA 2010

Decide on the exact places and times. For instance, where are you going to make the recordings? Is the room quiet enough? Is your microphone good have you already used it for the tasks in this course or are your going to use it for the first time? Are the procedures you intend to use appropriate will they help you answer your questions? How exactly are you going to arrive at the answers? Step by step. It may be a good idea to run your plan by your colleagues and /or your teacher. Feedback is always useful. Some people find checklists invaluable, especially when doing more complex and demanding things. Check the materials after the recording. If there is something wrong you want to fix it sooner rather than later. Be meticulous, careful and responsible once you start working on your materials. The program does almost everything, but you decide where to take the measurements. But don't waste too much time worrying about WHICH portion of the vowel to choose for measuring the formant frequencies, or WHERE to place the cursor and take the F0 value. Trust your researcher instincts and what you have learned so far. And just do it. :-D 5-4 Reporting Unlike the 'small' tasks during the course, this report should follow the widely accepted structure of a 'real' research report or research paper. The paper should be about 7-10 pages long, reasonably spaced, with the text typed in font-size 12 (tables can have smaller fonts). More importantly, the paper should have a clear structure:
Introduction: describe the problem you investigated and why you chose to study it. Previous research: you should mention at least some people whose papers,

articles or books you have read, some researchers who have already studied similar problems. Mentioned their work briefly, stating just what they investigated and, maybe, their most important findings. Keep this part of the paper short. Since this is a 'practice project', and not a research paper intended for publication, you can rely on just those several papers you got as literature for this course. In 'real-life research', you are expected to do a thorough research of the published papers in the area, to get informed about and familiar with the work of the researchers who have dealt with that topic before you.
The present study. In addition to stating the purpose and AIM of your study (and

that is a good place to state your research question clearly), you also need to describe your methodology in detail. Say who the participants in the study were, what procedures and techniques you used for data collection and for data analysis. Sometimes we have to describe the order of procedures, too, if that is relevant.
Results and discussion. Present your findings in a systematized way. In fact, you

should think about the suitable ways to classify, systematize and group your data for presentation even in your planning phase. You should

Acoustics MA 2010

decide on the form and content of your tables before you perform your analyses, so that you just fill them in as you proceed with the measurements. The way you organize the data should be such as to support the generalizations and conclusions you want to make. Since your research paper is of limited scope and cannot be longer than 10 pages, you need to come up with some form of result presentation that should tell your readers a lot but be 'economical' at the same time tables, graphs and charts save space and offer a lot of information. Offer comments and explanations in addition to the raw data. You can refer to other people's findings to show how your findings comply with theirs or not. Summarize the findings through several good points you want to make. Conclusion. Summarize the answer to your question. Show that you are aware of the scope and limitations of your study by suggesting possible directions for further research of the topic. 5-5 The presentation of your project and paper This outline of your paper would also be a perfect outline for your oral presentation. If you keep it tightly structured and clear, making a few slides for your final 'exam' presentation will be no problem.

Good luck! Hope you enjoy working on your project!