Cover not available

In:Intonational Grammar in Ibero-Romance: Approaches across linguistic subfields
Edited by Meghan E. Armstrong, Nicholas Henriksen and Maria del Mar Vanrell
[Issues in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics 6] 2016
► pp. 351–368

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload Book PDF
authorization required

Assessment of Spanish prosody in clinical populations

The case of Williams syndrome

 | Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia | Independent researcher
 | Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia | Independent researcher
Published online: 31 March 2016
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/ihll.6.16mar
We begin by reviewing ways of assessing prosody in Spanish-speaking individuals with disorders of different aetiologies. In Spanish, only one test has been specifically designed for prosody assessment in clinical populations: The Iberian Spanish version of the Profiling Elements of Prosody in Speech-Communication (PEPS-C) test. Building on our previous work, we describe the test and summarize results found with typically developing Spanish and Englishspeaking individuals. The use of the Spanish PEPS-C test in clinical populations is exemplified with the case of Williams syndrome, a neurodevelopmental disorder. By discussing the relevance of the results found both in Williams syndrome and typical development we highlight developmental patterns and cross-linguistic differences that should be taken into account when assessing Spanish prosody in clinical settings.
References (40)
References
Araya F., Verdugo, R., Quinteros, O., & Álvarez, G. (1988). Estudio de la prosodia en lesiones del hemisferio derecho [Prosody in right hemisphere lesions]. Revista Chilena de Neuro-Psiquiatría, 26(1), 51-56.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Baauw, S., Ruigendijk, R., & Cuetos, F. (2004). The interpretation of contrastive stress in Spanish-speaking children. In J. van Kampen y S. Baauw (Eds.), Proceedings of GALA 2003 (pp.103–114). Utrecht: LOT Occasional Series.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Beckman, M.E., Hirschberg, J., & Shattuck-Hufnagel, S. (2005). The original ToBI system and the evolution of the ToBI framework. In S-A. Jun (Ed.), Prosodic typology: The phonology of intonation and phrasing. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bellugi, U., Lichtenberger, L., Jones, W., Lai, Z., & George, M. (2000). The neurocognitive profile of Williams syndrome: A complex pattern of strengths and weaknesses. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 12, 7-29. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bellugi, U., Wang, P., & Jernigan, T.L. (1994). Williams syndrome: An unusual neuropsychological profile. In S. Broman and J. Grafman (Eds.), Atypical cognitive deficits in developmental disorders: Implications for brain function (pp. 23-56). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Brock, J. (2007). Language abilities in Williams syndrome: A critical review. Development and Psychopathology, 19, 97-127. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cuenca, M.H., & Barrio, M. (2010). Acoustic markers of prosodic boundaries in Spanish spontaneous alaryngeal speech. Clinical Linguistics & Phonetics, 24, 859-869. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cuenca, M.H., Barrio, M., & Páez, A. (2006). Evaluación acústica y análisis prosódico de la voz esofágica [Acoustic assessment and prosodic analysis of oesophageal voice]. In C. Hernández & M. Veyrat (Eds.) Actas del Primer Congreso Nacional de Lingüística Clínica, Vol. 2 (pp. 70-76). Valencia, Spain: Universitat.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
D’Imperio, M., Elordieta, G., Frota, S., Prieto, P., & Vigário, M. (2005). Intonational phrasing in Romance: The role of syntactic and prosodic structure. In S. Frota, M. Vigário, & M.J. Freitas (Eds.), Prosodies (pp. 59–98). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Enbe, C., Gurlekian, J., & Tobin, Y. (2006). A laboratory analysis of suprasegmental features in normal and pathological speech of Buenos Aires Spanish according to the theory of phonology as human behavior. In M. Díaz-Campos (Ed.), Selected Proceedings of the 2nd Conference on Laboratory Approaches to Spanish Phonetics and Phonology (pp. 83-105). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ewart A.K., Morris C.A., Atkinson, D.J., Jin, W.S., Sternes, K., Spallone, P., … Keating, M.T. (1993). Hemizygosity at the elastin locus in a developmental disorder, Williams syndrome. Nature Genetics, 5, 11-16. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Face, T.L. (2002). Local intonation marking of Spanish contrastive focus. Probus, 14, 71-92. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. (2006). Narrow focus intonation in Castilian Spanish absolute interrogatives. Journal of Language and Linguistics, 5, 295-311.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Jusczyk, P.W., & Kemler-Nelson, D.G. (1996). Syntactic units, prosody, and psychological reality during infancy. In J.L. Moragn & K. Demuth (Eds.), Signal to syntax (pp. 389-408). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Karmiloff-Smith, A., & Thomas, M. (2003). What can developmental disorders tell us about the neurocomputational constraints that shape development? The case of Williams syndrome. Development and Psychopathology, 15, 969-990. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Martínez-Castilla, P., & Peppé, S. (2008a). Developing a test of prosodic ability for speakers of Iberian Spanish. Speech Communication, 50, 900-915. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. (2008b). Intonation features of the expression of emotions in Spanish: Preliminary study for a prosody assessment procedure. Clinical Linguistics and Phonetics, 22, 363-370. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Martínez-Castilla, P., Sotillo, M., & Campos, R. (2011). Prosodic abilities of Spanish-speaking adolescents and adults with Williams syndrome. Language and Cognitive Processes, 26, 1055-1082. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Martínez-Castilla, P., Stojanovik, V., Setter, J., & Sotillo, M. (2012). Prosodic abilities in Spanish and English children with Williams syndrome: A cross-linguistic study. Applied Psycholinguistics, 33,1-22. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Martínez-Sánchez, F., García-Meilán, J.J., Pérez, E., Carro, J., & Arana, J.M. (2012). Patrones de prosodia expresiva en pacientes con enfermedad de Alzheimer[Expressive prosodic patterns in individuals with Alzheimer’s Disease]. Psicothema, 24, 16-21.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Martínez-Sánchez, F., Montero-Martínez, J.M., & de la Cerra, J. (2002). Sesgos cognitivos en el reconocimiento de expresiones emocionales de voz sintética en la alexitimia [Cognitive biases in the recognition of synthetic emotional speech in alexithymia]. Psicothema, 14, 344-349.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Morris, C.A., Demsey, S.A., Leonard, C.O., Dilts, C., & Blackburn, B.L. (1988). Natural history of Williams syndrome: Physical characteristics. Journal of Paediatrics, 113, 318-326. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Nazzi, T., Paterson, S.J., & Karmiloff-Smith, A. (2003). Word segmentation by infants with Williams syndrome. Infancy, 4, 251-271. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Nowicki, S. Jr., & Duke, M.P. (1994). Individual differences in the nonverbal communication of affect: The diagnostic analysis of nonverbal accuracy scale. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, 18, 9-35. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pascual, S., Solé, B., Castillón, J., Abadía, M., & Tejedor, M. (2005). Prosodia afectiva y reconocimiento facial y verbal de la emoción en la esquizofrenia[Affective prosody and verbal and facial recognition of emotion in schizophrenia]. Revista de Psiquiatría de la Facultad de Medicina de Barcelona, 32, 179-183.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Peppé, S.J.E., Martínez-Castilla, P., Coene, M., Hesling, I., Moen, I., & Gibbon, F. (2010). Assessing prosodic disorder in five European languages: Cross-linguistic differences in typical and atypical populations. International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 12(1), 1-7. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Peppé, S., & McCann, J. (2003). Assessing intonation and prosody in children with atypical language development: The PEPS-C test and the revised version. Clinical Linguistics and Phonetics, 7(4-5), 345-354. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pinker, S. (1991). Rules of language. Science, 286, 2355-2358.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Plesa-Skwerer, D., Faja, S., Schofield, C., Verbalis, A., & Tager-Flusberg, H. (2006). Perceiving facial and vocal expressions of emotion in individuals with Williams syndrome. American Journal on Mental Retardation, 111(1), 15-26. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Plesa-Skwerer, D., Schofield, C., Verbalis, A., Faja, S., & Tager-Flusberg, H. (2007). Receptive prosody in adolescents and adults with Williams syndrome. Language and Cognitive Processes, 22, 247-271. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Puyuelo, M., & Rondal, J.A. (2005). Speech rehabilitation in 10 Spanish-speaking children with severe cerebral palsy: A 4-year longitudinal study. Developmental Neurorehabilitation, 8(2), 113-116. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Reilly, J., Bernicot, J., Vicari, S., Lacroix, A., & Bellugi, U. (2005). Narratives in children with Williams syndrome: A cross-linguistic perspective. In D. Ravid & H. Bat-Zeev Shyldkrot (Eds.), Perspectives on language and language development: Essays in honor of Ruth A. Berman (pp. 303-312). Dordrecht: Kluwer. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Reilly, J., Klima, E., & Bellugi, U. (1990). Once more with feeling: Affect and language in atypical populations. Development and Psychopathology, 2, 367-391. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Sanz-Martín, A., Guevara, M.A., Corsi-Cabrera, M., Ondarza-Rovira, R., & Ramos-Loyo, J. (2006). Efecto diferencial de la lobectomía temporal izquierda y derecha sobre el reconocimiento y la experiencia emocional en pacientes con epilepsia[Differential effect of left and right temporal lobectomy on emotional experience and recognition in patients with epilepsy]. Revista de Neurología, 42, 391-398.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Shriberg, L.D., Kwiatkowski, J., & Rasmussen, C. (1990). The prosody-voice screening profile. Tucson, AZ: Communication Skill Builders.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Stojanovik, V. (2010) Understanding and production of prosody in children with Williams syndrome: A developmental trajectory approach. Journal of Neurolinguistics, 23,112-126. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Stojanovik, V., Setter, J., & van Ewijk, L. (2007). Intonation abilities of children with Williams syndrome: A preliminary investigation. Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research, 50, 1606-1617. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Strømme, P., Bjørnstad, P.G., & Ramstad, K. (2002). Prevalence estimation of Williams syndrome. Journal of Child Neurology, 17, 269-271. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Zubizarreta, M.L. (1998). Prosody, focus, and word order. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cited by (1)

Cited by one other publication

Corrales-Astorgano, Mario, David Escudero-Mancebo, César González-Ferreras, Valentín Cardeñoso Payo & Pastora Martínez-Castilla
2021. Analysis of atypical prosodic patterns in the speech of people with Down syndrome. Biomedical Signal Processing and Control 69 ► pp. 102913 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 12 december 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.

Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue