Auditory Feedback Tools, Model 3506

Auditory Feedback Tools (AFT) is a program option for CSL and Multi-Speech. It is also one of the standard modules within Visi-Pitch III and Sona-Speech. AFT combines five different auditory feedback tools into a software package for therapy and feedback applications.

Background

The effectiveness and value of auditory feedback has been documented in the professional literature. Indeed, portable devices are available for implementing auditory feedback. Most of these devices are single purpose (e.g., Delayed Auditory Feedback, or DAF). Some of the feedback devices are intended to disrupt feedback (DAF and Masking), and others are intended to enhance normal auditory feedback. Kay has introduced the Facilitator, which combines many modes of auditory feedback into one device. The Facilitator is described in separate literature, in a videotape, and on Kay’s website. AFT is a software system, which uses the CSL, Visi-Pitch III, or a sound card of the host computer to implement some of the features of the Facilitator. Because of its greater versatility and convenience, the Facilitator is still the instrument of choice. However, AFT brings some of these auditory feedback tools to the computer in an inexpensive, easy-to-use software program.

AFT does not have visual displays. It is designed to
focus clients on the aural characteristics of their speech.

Pacer

The pacer provides metronomic pacing in the form of an audible click to help assist patients with the timing/rhythm aspects of speech production. Among these are stutterers and patients with motor speech disorders such as cerebellar ataxia and Parkinson’s disease. The pacer rate is adjustable from 50 to 150 beats per minute adjustable in 5 beat increments. 

Delayed Auditory Feedback

The AFT program provides DAF, as a form of disruptive feedback, which has proven to be effective in fluency therapy. The DAF in AFT has a range of feedback from 150-500 milliseconds, adjustable in 10-millisecond increments.

Five Auditory Feedback Modes

• Metronomic Pacing

• Delayed Auditory Feedback (DAF)

• Looping

• Time-Warping

• Masking

Looping Playback

Looping records the patient’s (or clinician’s) speech and then plays the digitally recorded speech back immediately. This is used to develop critical self-listening skills. Patients can hear their own speech just as an outside listener would hear it. The clinician or the patient can record the target production. The absence of a visual display helps the patient focus strictly on the auditory aspects of speech. The duration of the recorded speech is from 5 to 30 seconds, adjustable in one-second increments.

The Facilitator is a portable device that does not require a computer 
for auditory feedback. The Facilitator is also available from Kay.

Time-Warping 

Time-warping provides the ability to record a patient’s speech and immediately play the speech back at different rates without changing the frequency content of the speech. This is very useful for allowing patients to hear their articulation clearly by slowing, or increasing, the rate of playback.

Masking

In masking mode, a speech-band noise signal is played through headphones so that patients cannot hear their own speech production. This deliberately degraded feedback has been shown, in some cases, to improve speech. In many patients, it can enhance the proprioception of speech/voice behaviors (e.g., easy onset, eliminating hard glottal attack, etc.).

Applications

The AFT program has a wide range of applications in speech-language pathology including voice, articulation, motor speech disorders, fluency, aphasia, ESL, professional voice, accent reduction, and learning disabilities.

Summary

AFT is based on extensive research, well documented in the professional literature, on the critical role of auditory feedback in speech-language pathology. The features included in AFT have been applied clinically for many years in stand-alone instruments. It combines five modalities of auditory feedback into an easy-to-use software program. This program is available in CSL and Multi-Speech systems and is included in the clinical packages, Visi-Pitch III and Sona-Speech.

Current CSL, Model 4500 and 4150, software and database options include:

• Analysis-Synthesis Laboratory (ASL), Model 5104

• Applied Speech Science for Dysarthrias, Model 5153

• Applied Speech Science for Voice & Resonance Disorders, Model 5156

• Auditory Feedback Tools, Model 3506

• Disordered Voice Database, Model 4337

• Games, Model 5167

• Motor Speech Profile, Model 5141

• Multi-Dimensional Voice Program, Model 5105

• Neuroscience for Human Communications, Model 5155

• Palatometer Database, Model 4333

• Phonetic & Perception Simulation Programs, Model 5151

• Phonetic Database, Model 4332

• Real-Time EGG Analysis, Model 5138

• Real-Time Pitch, Model 5121

• Real-Time Spectrogram, Model 5129

• Respiration, Phonation and Prosody Simulation, Model 5152

• Signal Enhancement Program, Model 5142

• Sona-Match, Model 5127

• Speech Articulation: Animation of Muscle Vectors, Model 5154

• Video Phonetics Program and Database, Model 5150

• Voice Range Profile, Model 4326 

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