Jeffrey Berry, Ph.D., receives National Science Foundation grant
Dr. Jeffrey Berry, assistant professor of speech pathology, and Dr. Mike Johnson, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering, received a grant from the National Science Foundation - EAGER program. The award of $176, 431 will support a project entitled “Acoustic-Articulator Modeling for Pronunciation Analysis.” The goal of the project is to develop an articulatory-acoustic database of native and non-native (Mandarin) American-English speech. This database will be comprised of speech-movement data and synchronized speech-acoustic data acquired using a 3D speech-movement tracking system. The database will be distributed freely to the international research community to help support improvements in the development of Computer-Aided Language Learning systems. Current systems lack a sufficient understanding about the details of the articulatory errors that contribute to poor pronunciation in non-native speech. Improvements in native-Mandarin pronunciation of American English will improve teaching effectiveness for international students and faculty and support integration into the American workforce.
