Exploring the effect of lexicality and listener experience on gradient ratings of Swedish sibilant fricatives.

This study explores the influence of lexicality on gradient judgments of Swedish sibilant fricatives by contrasting ratings of initial fricatives in words and word fragments (initial CV-syllables). Visual-Analogue Scale (VAS) judgments were elicited from experienced listeners (speech-language pathologists; SLPs) and inexperienced listeners, and compared with respect to the effects of lexicality using Bayesian mixed-effects beta regression. Overall, SLPs had higher intra- and interrater reliability than inexperienced listeners.

Static and dynamic spectral characteristics of Swedish voiceless fricatives.

Descriptions of the acoustic characteristics of Swedish voiceless fricatives are scarce and are limited to static measures derived from the speech of a small number of speakers. The current study provides an updated acoustic description of the static (spectral, temporal, and intensity) characteristics of word-initial voiceless fricatives in Central Standard Swedish. In addition, temporal variation of spectral centre of gravity is modelled using a generalized additive mixed model.

A survey of Swedish speech-language pathologists' practices regarding assessment of speech sound disorders.

Purpose: To explore Swedish clinical practice regarding assessment of suspected Speech Sound Disorders (SSD) in children.

Methods: A web-based questionnaire, regarding assessment of SSD in children 4;6-6;11 (years; months), was distributed to Swedish speech-language pathologists (SLPs) through social media and online forums. The questions concerned the frequency and manner of assessment for seven assessment components, chosen based on a review of international recommendations for SSD assessment.

Subjective ratings of age-of-acquisition: exploring issues of validity and rater reliability.

This study aimed to investigate concerns of validity and reliability in subjective ratings of age-of-acquisition (AoA), through exploring characteristics of the individual rater. An additional aim was to validate the obtained AoA ratings against two corpora - one of child speech and one of adult speech - specifically exploring whether words over-represented in the child-speech corpus are rated with lower AoA than words characteristic of the adult-speech corpus. The results show that less than one-third of participating informants' ratings are valid and reliable.