La electromagnetometría en el estudio de la producción del habla

Abstract

This article presents a brief and simplified description of the electromagnetic midsagittal articulometer (EMMA or EMA) as well as some of the advantages that its use in speech production provides. The articulometer allows us to obtain direct and real-time information of the movement of all the articulators, including the tongue. The articles points out some basic technical aspects and describes the functioning and the standard experimental protocol used with EMMA. The signal obtained from the articulometer gives us the opportunity to study a large amount of reliable and precise quantitative data that can be used to test a great variety of theoretical issues within the phonetics-phonology field. This versatility is illustra-ted here with some results obtained in experiments dealing with different languages. These results provide a picture of the possibilities that the articulometer offers in the study of speech production and of phonetics-phonology in general.