A Systematic Investigation of Phonetic Complexity Effects on Articulatory Motor Performance in Progressive Dysarthria

Understanding Communication and Cognitive Impairments in Neurodegenerative Disorders

The goal is to improve the fundamental knowledge about articulatory motor performance in people with Lou Gehrig's disease (also known as ALS) and Parkinson's disease (PD), in order to develop more sensitive assessments for progressive speech loss, which may lead to the improved timing of speech therapies.

The long-term goal is to optimize dysarthria assessment by improving the early detection and tracking of articulatory performance in progressive dysarthrias. The short-term goal of the proposed cross-sectional study is to focus on ALS and PD and quantify articulatory kinematic performance as a function of phonetic complexity, which is experimentally manipulated based on theoretical principles of speech motor development. The research strategy is to use 3D electromagnetic articulography to examine phonetic complexity effects of single word stimuli at the articulatory kinematic level in 15 talkers each with preclinical, mild, and moderate dysarthria, relative to 45 controls. The central hypothesis is that as dysarthria severity increases the discrepancy in articulatory performance, indexed by movement speed, distance, coordination, and variability, between people with dysarthria and typical controls will significantly increase at a lower phonetic complexity level.

Inclusion Criteria:

1. May or may not have a neurological impairment.
2. Age range of 19-90 years.
3. Male or female.
4. Provide written consent before any study specific procedures are performed.
5. Have ability to comply with basic instructions.
6. Monolingual English speaker.
7. Have ability to partake in a 90 minute data collection.

Exclusion Criteria:

1. Any speech, language, cognition, or hearing impairment prior to diagnosis of a neurodegenerative disease.
2. Anyone not appropriate for study participation, as deemed by the principal investigator.