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Purpose: The purpose of this study was to analyse the relationship between automatic vowel articulation index (aVAI) and direct magnitude estimation (DME) among speakers with Parkinson's disease (PD) and healthy controls. We further analysed the potential of aVAI to serve as an objective measure of speech impairment in the clinical setting. Method: Speech samples from native Finnish speakers were utilised. Expert raters utilised DME to scale the intelligibility of speech samples. aVAI scores for PD speakers and healthy control speakers were analysed in relationship to DME speech intelligibility ratings and, among PD speakers, disease stage utilising nonparametric statistical analysis. Result: Mean DME intelligibility ratings were lower among PD speakers compared to healthy controls. Mean aVAI scores were nearly the same between speaker groups. DME intelligibility ratings and aVAI were strongly correlated within the PD speaker group. aVAI and DME intelligibility ratings were moderately correlated with disease stage as measured by the Hoehn and Yahr scale. Conclusion: aVAI was observed to be a promising tool for analysing vowel articulation in PD speakers. Further research is warranted on the application of aVAI as an objective measure of severity of speech impairment in the clinical setting, with varying patient populations and speech samples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to reveal dynamic changes in prosodic prominence patterns associated with Parkinson's disease (PD). To fulfill this purpose, the study proposes an exploratory methodology involving measuring a novel syllable-based prosody index (SPI) and performing functional principal component analyses (fPCAs) in a semi-automatic manner. First, SPI trajectories were collected from 31 speakers with PD before and after speech therapy and from 36 healthy controls. Then, the SPI trajectories were converted to continuous functions using B-splines. Finally, the functional SPIs were examined using fPCAs. The results showed that PD was associated with an increase of overall prominence for male speakers. The findings regarding higher prominence patterns in PD were supported by traditional phonetic measurements. For female speakers, however, there were no significant differences in prosodic prominence between speakers with PD and healthy controls. The results encourage to explore the proposed methodology also in analyses of other forms of atypical speech. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: The purpose of this pilot study was to examine voice quality changes in individuals with early-stage Parkinson's disease (PD) utilizing the Acoustic Voice Quality Index (AVQI) and Acoustic Breathiness Index (ABI) over approximately a 1-year period., Study Design: Follow-up study., Methods: Baseline and follow-up data were gathered from the PDSTUlong speech corpus. The data for both time points included: speaker background information, sustained vowels, reading samples, and measures of PD severity (Hoehn and Yahr scores and Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale III scores [UPDRS-III]). All speakers (N = 12) were native Finnish speakers. AVQIv03.01 and ABI analysis were completed in VOXplot v2.0.1. Changes in AVQI and ABI scores between baseline and follow-up were examined via causal analysis. Further, AVQI and ABI were analyzed in relation to measures of PD severity., Results: Baseline mean AVQI score was 1.79 (range 0.14-4.83, SD=1.60), whereas follow-up mean AVQI score was 2.25 (range 0.55-4.53, SD=1.36). Baseline mean ABI score, in turn, was 2.92 (range 1-27 - 5.31, SD=1.57), whereas follow-up mean ABI score was 3.42 (range 1.40-5.40, SD=1.38). A significant difference was found between baseline and follow-up measures for both AVQI (Z = -2.002, P = 0.045) and ABI (Z = -2.197, P = 0.028). A significant difference in smoothed cepstral peak prominence (Z = -2.118, P = 0.034) and harmonics-to-noise ratio (Z = -1.961, P = 0.050) was also found between the two measurement periods. Change in AVQI and ABI were not correlated with the change in measures of PD severity., Conclusion: Over approximately 1-year, a statistical change was observed in AVQI and ABI scores, even in such a small dataset. The specific qualities of breathiness and hoarseness showed the most significant progression. Changes in voice quality were more prominent in ABI analysis., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest No author has personal or financial interests that affects their objectivity or serves as a potential conflict in this research., (Copyright © 2024 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)