Acoustics of
the Vowel
Preliminaries
the Vowel
Preliminaries
Materials Part III - Lack of Correspondence between Vowels and Patterns of Relative Spectral Energy Maxima or Formant Patterns
M8.3: “Inversions” of Relative Spectral Energy Maxima and Minima and “Inverse” Formant Patterns in Sounds of Individual Vowels
Content of illustration
For each of the vowels /a–ɑ, o, u / and for each speaker group, Figures 11 to 13 show pairs of sounds produced at different fundamental frequencies exhibiting “inverse” relative spectral maxima and minima in terms of “inverse” spectral envelope curves ≤ 1.5: whereas a relative minimum in the spectral envelope occurs for one sound of a pair, a peak for the other sound is manifest, and vice versa; however, the perceived vowel quality is maintained. The same holds true for comparisons of the respective calculated filter curves and, for most cases, for comparisons of patterns of manifest formants.
Link to the spectra of the Figures
Figure 1: Sounds of /a–ɑ/, produced at different F0 by children, women and men, which exhibit "inverse" relative spectral maxima and minima in terms of "inverse" spectral envelope curves ≤ 1.5 kHz.
Figure 2: Sounds of /o/, produced at different F0 by children, women and men, which exhibit "inverse" relative spectral maxima and minima in terms of "inverse" spectral envelope curves ≤ 1.5 kHz.
Figure 3: Sounds of /u/, produced at different F0 by children, women and men, which exhibit "inverse" relative spectral maxima and minima in terms of "inverse" spectral envelope curves ≤ 1.5 kHz.