Articulatory modeling of the S-shaped F2 trajectories observed in \"Ohman's spectrographic analysis of VCV syllables

Abstract

The synthesis of Ohman's VCV sequences with intervocalic plosive consonants was first achieved 30 years ago using the DRM model. However, this approach remains primarily acoustic and lacks articulatory constraints. In this study, the same 75 VCVs are analyzed, but generated with the Maeda model, using trajectory planning that differentiates vowel-to-vowel transitions from consonantal influences. Synthetic data exhibit similar characteristics to Ohman's sequences, including the presence of S-shaped F2 trajectories. Furthermore, locus equations (LEs) for F2 and F3 are computed from synthetic CV data to investigate their underlying determinism, leading to a reassessment of conventional interpretations. The findings indicate that, although articulatory planning is structured separately for vowel and consonant groups, S-shaped F2 trajectories emerge from a composite mechanism governed by the coordinated synergy of all articulators.