Audible Aspects of Speech Preparation

Noises made before the acoustic onset of speech are typically ignored, yet may reveal aspects of speech production planning and be relevant to discourse turn-taking. We quantify the nature and timing of such noises, using an experimental method designed to elicit naturalistic yet controlled speech initiation data. Speakers listened to speech input, then spoke when prompt material became visible onscreen. They generally inhaled audibly before uttering a short sentence, but not before a single word. In both tasks, articulatory movements caused acoustic spikes due to weak click-like articulatory separations or stronger clicks via an ingressive, lingual airstream. The acoustic onset of the sentences was delayed relative to the words. This does not appear to be planned, but seems a side-effect of the longer duration of inhalation.