Vowels are distinguished by the location of F1 and F2 formants

Evidence

Vowel sounds are characterized by voicing, which results in a spectrum with a fundamental frequency (F0), related to voice pitch, and harmonics of F0. The spectrum is shaped by vocal tract resonances, or formants. The locations of the lowest two frequency formants (F1 and F2), distinguish different vowel sounds (Fant 1960 ). — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 5472

Categorization

Category: Definitional Content

• DEFINE: Defines F0, formants, and the F1/F2 vowel-distinguishing framework.

Related

• Vowels are distinguished by the two lowest vocal tract resonance frequencies. (similarity 0.97)
• Vowel identity depends on the locations of the two lowest vocal tract formants (similarity 0.95)
• Vowels are distinguished by formant frequencies controlled by tongue, jaw, and lips (similarity 0.88)
• Vowels keep the vocal tract open and vary little by context, unlike consonants (similarity 0.86)
• Formants are standing-wave resonances of the vocal tract itself (similarity 0.86)
• Identifying a vowel requires at least two of its formants (similarity 0.86)
• Vowel formant frequencies are predictable from the location of vocal tract constrictions (similarity 0.83)
• Vowel identification depends on formant peaks being representable in the output spectrum. (similarity 0.83)
• Simultaneous synthetic vowels can be separated by their fundamental frequencies alone. (similarity 0.83)
• Consonants differ from vowels in intensity, context-dependence, and articulation constriction (similarity 0.82)
• All vowel distinctions reduce to tongue position, openness, and lip rounding (similarity 0.82)
• Consonants are less intense and more context-dependent than vowels. (similarity 0.82)
• Double-vowel tasks isolate f0 differences as cues for separating simultaneous speech (similarity 0.81)
• Voice differences include formant and temporal cues beyond fundamental frequency (similarity 0.81)
• Vocal tract resonance multiplies each vocal fold harmonic to shape the sung vowel spectrum (similarity 0.80)