Characterization and modeling of speech-segment durations

Two types of analyses have been performed on the measured durations of recordings produced by six talkers reading two scripts of approximately 300 words each. The texts, the combined visual-auditory marking technique and preliminary results were reported earlier by Crystal & House [2]. The average durations and standard deviations of various classes of speech sounds, as well as individual speech sounds, have been determined and segmental measurements are compared to earlier data and to various pertinent published reports. The histograms of the measured durations of various sounds and categories have been fitted with distributions which are, equivalently, the exit-probability sequence for a Markov chain, or the impulse response of an IIR digital-filter network.