Comprehensibility and Naturalness of Text-To-Speech Synthetic Materials for EFL Listeners

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概要

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• Text-to-speech (TTS) synthesis technology, which has rapidly advanced in recent years, can be an extremely useful tool to help EFL teachers make listening materials for their students. However, little has been researched regarding the use of synthetic speech created by a recent TTS program (e.g., Globalvoice English) as an alternative to human speech. Thus, this paper examines the quality of synthetic speech by comparing it with natural human speech. The comprehensibility and naturalness of the two speech types were measured by administering a listening multiple-choice test and a questionnaire. Results suggested that (1) even though natural speech tended to be comprehended better than synthetic speech, prior exposure to synthetic speech seemed to affect its comprehensibility, (2) synthetic speech was perceived to be almost as natural as human speech by both upper and lower proficiency groups, and (3) when compared with higher level students, more students in the lower level group tended to prefer synthetic speech. These results support the application of synthetic speech in creating materials for English education, though further studies are still necessary to apply the findings to other pedagogical and research contexts.

• 2011-10-27

著者

• 平井 明代

  University Of Tsukuba

• 大木 俊英

  Hakuoh University

関連論文

• Comprehensibility and Naturalness of Text-To-Speech Synthetic Materials for EFL Listeners
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