Considering Performance in the Automated and Manual Coding of Sociolinguistic Variables: Lessons From Variable (ING).

Impressionistic coding of sociolinguistic variables like English (ING), the alternation between pronunciations like and , has been a central part of the analytic workflow in studies of language variation and change for over a half-century. Techniques for automating the measurement and coding for a wide range of sociolinguistic data have been on the rise over recent decades but procedures for coding some features, especially those without clearly defined acoustic correlates like (ING), have lagged behind others, such as vowels and sibilants. This paper explores computational methods for automatically coding variable (ING) in speech recordings, examining the use of automatic speech recognition procedures related to forced alignment (using the Montreal Forced Aligner) as well as supervised machine learning algorithms (linear and radial support vector machines, and random forests).

Perceptual tracking of distinct distributional regularities within a single voice.

The speech signal is inherently variable and listeners need to recalibrate when local, short-term distributions of acoustic dimensions deviate from long-term representation. The present experiment investigated the specificity of this perceptual adjustment, addressing whether the perceptual system is capable of tracking differing simultaneous short-term acoustic distributions of the same speech categories, conditioned by context. The results indicated that instead of aggregating over the contextual variation, listeners tracked separate distributional statistics for instances of speech categories experienced in different phonetic/lexical contexts, suggesting that perceptual learning is not only influenced by distributional statistics, but also by external factors such as contextual information.

Perceiving Southernness: Vowel categories and acoustic cues in Southernness ratings.

Southern U.S. speech has been the focus of much sociophonetic work.

Expectations about the source of a speaker's accent affect accent adaptation.

When encountering speakers whose accents differ from the listener's own, listeners initially show a processing cost, but that cost can be attenuated after short term exposure. The extent to which processing foreign accents (L2-accents) and within-language accents (L1-accents) is similar is still an open question. This study considers whether listeners' expectations about the source of a speaker's accent-whether the speaker is purported to be an L1 or an L2 speaker-affect intelligibility.

The Goldilocks Zone of Perceptual Learning.

Background/aims: Lexically guided perceptual learning in speech is the updating of linguistic categories based on novel input disambiguated by the structure provided in a recognized lexical item. We test the range of variation that allows for perceptual learning by presenting listeners with items that vary from subtle within-category variation to fully remapped cross-category variation.

Methods: Experiment 1 uses a lexically guided perceptual learning paradigm with words containing noncanonical /s/ realizations from s/ʃ continua that correspond to "typical," "ambiguous," "atypical," and "remapped" steps.

Re-Examining Phonetic Variability in Native and Non-Native Speech.

Background/aims: Non-native speech is frequently characterized as being more variable than native speech. However, the few studies that have directly investigated phonetic variability in the speech of second language learners have considered a limited subset of native/non-native language pairings and few linguistic features.

Methods: The present study examines group-level withinspeaker variability and central tendencies in acoustic properties of vowels andstops produced by learners of Japanese from two native language backgrounds, English and Mandarin, as well as native Japanese speakers.

Processing Relationships Between Language-Being-Spoken and Other Speech Dimensions in Monolingual and Bilingual Listeners.

While indexical information is implicated in many levels of language processing, little is known about the internal structure of the system of indexical dimensions, particularly in bilinguals. A series of three experiments using the speeded classification paradigm investigated the relationship between various indexical and non-linguistic dimensions of speech in processing. Namely, we compared the relationship between a lesser-studied indexical dimension relevant to bilinguals, which language is being spoken (in these experiments, either Mandarin Chinese or English), with: talker identity (Experiment 1), talker gender (Experiment 2), and amplitude of speech (Experiment 3).

Insulin-like growth factor I reduces lipid oxidation and foam cell formation via downregulation of 12/15-lipoxygenase.

Objective: We have shown that insulin-like growth factor I (IGF-1) infusion in Apoe(-/-) mice decreased atherosclerotic plaque size and plaque macrophage and lipid content suggesting that IGF-1 suppressed formation of macrophage-derived foam cells. Since 12/15-lipoxygenase (12/15-LOX) plays an important role in OxLDL and foam cell formation, we hypothesized that IGF-1 downregulates 12/15-LOX, thereby suppressing lipid oxidation and foam cell formation.

Approach And Results: We found that IGF-1 decreased 12/15-LOX plaque immunopositivity and serum OxLDL levels in Apoe(-/-) mice.

The effects of lexical neighbors on stop consonant articulation.

Lexical neighbors (words sharing phonological structure with a target word) have been shown to influence the expression of phonetic contrasts for vowels and initial voiceless consonants. Focusing on minimal pair neighbors (e.g.

Linguistic processing of accented speech across the lifespan.

In most of the world, people have regular exposure to multiple accents. Therefore, learning to quickly process accented speech is a prerequisite to successful communication. In this paper, we examine work on the perception of accented speech across the lifespan, from early infancy to late adulthood.

Differential requirement for nitric oxide in IGF-1-induced anti-apoptotic, anti-oxidant and anti-atherosclerotic effects.

We have shown previously that insulin like-growth factor I (IGF-1) suppressed atherosclerosis in Apoe(-/-) mice and activated endothelial nitric oxide (NO) synthase. To determine whether IGF-1-induced atheroprotection depends on NO, IGF-1- or saline-infused mice were treated with l-NAME, the pan-NO synthase inhibitor or with d-NAME (control). IGF-1 reduced atherosclerosis in both the d-NAME and l-NAME groups suggesting that IGF-1's anti-atherogenic effect was NO-independent.

Angiotensin II induced catabolic effect and muscle atrophy are redox dependent.

Angiotensin II (Ang II) causes skeletal muscle wasting via an increase in muscle catabolism. To determine whether the wasting effects of Ang II were related to its ability to increase NADPH oxidase-derived reactive oxygen species (ROS) we infused wild-type C57BL/6J or p47(phox)(-/-) mice with vehicle or Ang II for 7days. Superoxide production was increased 2.

Low circulating insulin-like growth factor I increases atherosclerosis in ApoE-deficient mice.

Some clinical studies have suggested that lower IGF-I levels may be associated with an increased risk of ischemic heart disease. We generated atherosclerosis-prone apolipoprotein E-deficient (ApoE(-/-)) mice with 6T alleles (6T/ApoE(-/-) mice) with a 20% decline in circulating IGF-I and fed these mice and control ApoE(-/-) mice with normal chow or a Western diet for 12 wk to evaluate the effect of low serum IGF-I on atherosclerosis progression. We found that the 6T/ApoE(-/-) phenotype was characterized by an increased atherosclerotic burden, elevated plaque macrophages, and increased proinflammatory cytokine TNF-α levels compared with ApoE(-/-) controls.

The effect of nebivolol versus metoprolol succinate extended release on asymmetric dimethylarginine in hypertension.

This study sought to determine if metoprolol succinate ER (MET), and nebivolol (NEB), a β1-AR with increased bioavailability of nitric oxide (NO), would have differing effects on plasma asymmetric dimethylarginine concentration in hypertensives. It was hypothesized that NEB, a β1-AR antagonist and β3-AR agonist with NO-releasing properties, and MET, only a β1-AR antagonist, would have different effects on plasma asymmetric dimethylarginine (ADMA) concentration. Forty-one hypertensive subjects randomly received either 50 mg of MET (n = 19) or 5 mg of NEB (n = 22) for 4 weeks followed by 100 mg MET and 10 mg NEB for 4 weeks.

Smooth muscle cell-specific insulin-like growth factor-1 overexpression in Apoe-/- mice does not alter atherosclerotic plaque burden but increases features of plaque stability.

Objective: Growth factors may play a permissive role in atherosclerosis initiation and progression, in part via their promotion of vascular smooth muscle cell (VSMC) accumulation in plaques. However, unstable human plaques often have a relative paucity of VSMC, which has been suggested to contribute to plaque rupture and erosion and to clinical events. Insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) is an endocrine and autocrine/paracrine growth factor that is a mitogen for VSMC, but when infused into Apoe(-/-) mice it paradoxically reduces atherosclerosis burden.

Growth hormone-releasing peptide-2 suppresses vascular oxidative stress in ApoE-/- mice but does not reduce atherosclerosis.

GH-releasing peptide-2 (GHRP-2) is a synthetic peptide that increases circulating GH and IGF-I levels. It also binds to CD36, a scavenger receptor for oxidized low-density lipoprotein (OxLDL), and may prevent cellular uptake of this proatherogenic complex. To determine its potential antiatherogenic effects, GHRP-2 (20 microg twice daily) was administered sc to ApoE(-/-) mice for 12 wk.

IGF-1 reduces inflammatory responses, suppresses oxidative stress, and decreases atherosclerosis progression in ApoE-deficient mice.

Objective: Whereas growth factors, via their ability to stimulate vascular smooth muscle cell (VSMC) proliferation and migration, have been thought to play a permissive role in atherosclerosis initiation and progression, the role of insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) is unknown. Here we report for the first time that IGF-1 infusion decreased atherosclerotic plaque progression in ApoE-deficient mice on a Western diet.

Methods And Results: ApoE-null mice (8 weeks) were infused with vehicle or recombinant human IGF-1 and fed a high-fat diet for 12 weeks.