Individual variation of larynx position reflects human morphological differences and thus contributes to generating biological information in speech sounds. This study examines the factors of orofacial morphology that co-vary with larynx position based on MRI data collected for 12 Japanese and 12 English speakers. The materials are midsagittal craniofacial images, and the method is based on the measurement of angles and indices. Among all the measures examined, the aspect ratio of the oral cavity in the lateral view showed the highest correlation (r=0.87) with larynx height index (ratio of arytenoid - palatal plane distance and anterior nasal spine - nasopharyngeal wall distance), and a facial angle (angle of maxillary incisor - nasion - nasopharyngeal wall) showed the second highest correlation (r=0.66) with larynx height index. The result indicates that larynx position co-varies with oral cavity shape, being higher when oral cavity shape is flatter and more prognathic.
Cite as: Honda, K., Tiede, M.K. (1998) An MRI study on the relationship between oral cavity shape and larynx position. Proc. 5th International Conference on Spoken Language Processing (ICSLP 1998), paper 0686, doi: 10.21437/ICSLP.1998-358
@inproceedings{honda98_icslp,
author={Kiyoshi Honda and Mark K. Tiede},
title={{An MRI study on the relationship between oral cavity shape and larynx position}},
year=1998,
booktitle={Proc. 5th International Conference on Spoken Language Processing (ICSLP 1998)},
pages={paper 0686},
doi={10.21437/ICSLP.1998-358}
}