• Journal of the Korea Institute of Information and Communication Engineering
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• v.19 no.5
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• pp.1243-1250
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• 2015

This paper presents an effective recognition method of VPI patient's speech for a VPI speech reconstruction system. Speaker adaptation technique is employed to improve VPI speech recognition. This paper proposes to use simulated speech for generating an initial model for speaker adaptation, in order to effectively utilize the small size of VPI speech for model adaptation. We obtain 83.60% in average word accuracy by applying MLLR for speaker adaptation. The proposed speaker adaptation method using simulated speech model brings 6.38% improvement in average accuracy. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed speaker adaptation method is highly effective for developing recognition system of VPI speech which is not suitable for constructing large-size speech database.

• Archives of Craniofacial Surgery
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.163-167
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• 2018

Velopharyngeal insufficiency (VPI) is a common complication after primary palatoplasty. Although the several surgical treatments of VPI have been introduced, there is no consensus guide to select the optimal surgical treatment for VPI patients. The selection of surgical treatment for VPI depends on a multimodal patient evaluation, such as perceptual speech evaluation, nasometery and nasoendoscopy. We can provide more adequate treatment for VPI through the deeper understanding of anatomy and physiology in VPI.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Information and Communication Engineering
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.33-38
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• 2019

This paper proposes an effective recognition method of VPI patient's speech employing DNN-HMM-based speech recognition system, and evaluates the recognition performance compared to GMM-HMM-based system. The proposed method employs speaker adaptation technique to improve VPI speech recognition. This paper proposes to use simulated VPI speech for generating a prior model for speaker adaptation and selective learning of weight matrices of DNN, in order to effectively utilize the small size of VPI speech for model adaptation. We also apply Linear Input Network (LIN) based model adaptation technique for the DNN model. The proposed speaker adaptation method brings 2.35% improvement in average accuracy compared to GMM-HMM based ASR system. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed DNN-HMM-based speech recognition system is effective for VPI speech with small-sized speech data, compared to conventional GMM-HMM system.

• Korean Journal of Cleft Lip And Palate
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.45-52
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• 2005

Velopharyngeal Insufficiency(VPI); the failure of velum, the lateral wall and the posterior pharyngeal wall to separate the nasal cavity from pharyngeal cavity during speech, can be caused by congenital conditions include cleft palate, submucous cleft palate and congenital palatal insufficiency. Speech problems of VPI are characterized by hypernasality, nasal air emission, increased nasal air flow and decreased intelligibility. These speech problems of VPI can be treated with the surgical procedure, the application of temporary prosthesis and speech therapy. Biofeedback technique with Nasometer is a speech treatment method of VPI that commonly used as one component of a comprehensive procedure for improvement of speech in patients with VPI. In this article describes a case of VPI treated by biofeedback technique with Nasometer; which showed satisfactory result in nasalance and formant analysis after the speech therapy during 9 months.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.9 no.4
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• pp.3-14
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• 2002

VPI occurs when the velum and lateral and posterior pharyngeal wall fail to separate the nasal cavity from the oral cavity during deglutition and speech. There are a number of congenital and acquired conditions which result in VPI. Congenital conditions include cleft palate, submucous cleft palate and congenital palatal insufficiency (CPI). Acquired conditions include carcinoma of the palate or pharynx and neurologic disorders. The speech characteristics of VPI is characterized by hypernasality, nasal air emission, decreased intraoral air pressure, increased nasal air flow, decreased intelligibility. VPI can be treated with various methods that include speech therapy, surgical procedures to reduce the velopharyngeal gap, speech aid prosthesis, and combination of surgery and prosthesis. This article describes four cases of VPI treated by speech aid prosthesis and speech therapy with satisfactory result.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Information and Communication Engineering
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• v.18 no.7
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• pp.1740-1748
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• 2014

This paper focuses on listening test and acoustic analysis of patients' speech with velopharyngeal insufficiency (VPI) and normal speakers' simulation speech. In this research, a set consisting of 50-words, vowels and single syllables is determined for speech database construction. A web-based listening evaluation system is developed for a convenient/automated evaluation procedure. The analysis results show the trend of incorrect recognition for VPI speech and the one for simulation speech are similar. Such similarity is also confirmed by comparing the formant locations of vowel and spectrum of consonant sounds. These results show that the simulation method for VPI speech is effective at generating the speech signals similar to actual VPI patient's speech. It is expected that the simulation speech data can be effectively employed for our future work such as acoustic model adaptation.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Laryngology, Phoniatrics and Logopedics
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.45-51
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• 2002

The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of vowel type on the nasalance score. Twenty one male adults without VPI produced 5 types of vowels (/a/, /e/, /i/, /o/, /u/) in two conditions-normal and simulated VPI condition. Nasalance scores were measured for each vowel. These data were compared between conditions and among vowel types. The results were as follow : For all vowels, nasalance scores were significantly higher in simulated VPI condition than in normal condition. The two conditions yielded different patterns in terms of the degree of nasalance across the 5 vowels. In normal condition, nasalance scores were higher in front vowels than in medial or back vowels. But in simulated VPI condition, nasalance scores were higher in high vowels than in mid or low vowels.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Laryngology, Phoniatrics and Logopedics
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.210-216
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• 1997

Many tools have been used to evaluate the voice abnormalities of velopharyngeal insufficiency(VPI). The aim of study was to obtain the objective evaluation method of VPI by comparing the acoustic and nasalance data of experimentally induced VPI group and those of normal control group. Ten healthy young men were included in this study Mild and severe VPI were experimentally induced by retracting velopharyngeal movement. Using the nasometer, we obtained the nasalance score of the sustained oral vowels and those of three types of nasometer passages and the slope scores of nasogram of nasal words. And we analysed the change of formant frequencies for the sustained oral vowels and the changes of various parameters of hyper-tnasality by the computerized speech analysis system. The nasalance score of sustained /a/ was increased significantly in VPI conditions. There was no changes in the slope score of nasogram. On the acoustic speech analysis, the second formant frequencies of vowel /e/ and /i/ were decreased significantly in VPI conditions. This results suggested that the measurement of nasalance score and formant frequency might be useful in the evaluation of VPI.

• Korean Journal of Heritage: History & Science
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• v.50 no.1
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• pp.58-77
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• 2017

This study applied the index called Visual Perception Intensity (VPI) which quantitatively deals with landscape values and viewpoints to designate the cultural heritage areas in the Scenic Sites. The results of the study are as follows. First, a VPI selection index was presented for designating the cultural heritage areas in the Scenic Sites. The index was applied in consideration of the distance from the viewing point to the object and its incident angle. In addition, the process of the VPI analysis was implemented with GIS and the analysis algorithm was constructed. Second, the possibility of VPI was examined by comparing the simple frequency of the cumulative visibility with the results of the VPI. The VPI was analyzed to be more influenced by the incidence angle than the distance between the viewpoint and the object within a 4.74 km area. Third, a field survey was performed to investigate the effectiveness of the VPI classification. The survey was implemented based on the results of the investigation into the VPI to examine whether human visual perception was fully reflected. It was confirmed through the field survey that an area with high VPI was also an important area. Fourth, a plan for the cultural heritage area adjustment was constructed by applying the VPI to the areas already designated as Scenic Sites. As a result of classifying the VPI into three classes, it was found that the areas with the second class or higher were needed to be designated as cultural heritage areas and the areas with the third class as the Historical and Cultural Environments Preservation Area.

• Korean Journal of Otorhinolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery
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• v.55 no.8
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• pp.498-507
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• 2012

Background and Objectives We aimed to develop a Korean version of the velopharyngeal insufficiency (VPI) speech corpus system. Subjects and Method After developing a 3-channel simultaneous speech recording device capable of recording nasal/oral and normal compound speech separately, voice data were collected from VPI patients aged more than 10 years with/without the history of operation or prior speech therapy. This was compared to a control group for which VPI was simulated by using a french-3 nelaton tube inserted via both nostril through nasopharynx and pulling the soft palate anteriorly in varying degrees. The study consisted of three transcriptors: a speech therapist transcribed the voice file into text, a second transcriptor graded speech intelligibility and severity and the third tagged the types and onset times of misarticulation. The database were composed of three main tables regarding (1) speaker's demographics, (2) condition of the recording system and (3) transcripts. All of these were interfaced with the Praat voice analysis program, which enables the user to extract exact transcribed phrases for analysis. Results In the simulated VPI group, the higher the severity of VPI, the higher the nasalance score was obtained. In addition, we could verify the vocal energy that characterizes hypernasality and compensation in nasal/oral and compound sounds spoken by VPI patients as opposed to that characgerizes the normal control group. Conclusion With the Korean version of VPI speech corpus system, patients' common difficulties and speech tendencies in articulation can be objectively evaluated. Comparing these data with those of the normal voice, mispronunciation and dysarticulation of patients with VPI can be corrected.