Key word signing: listeners' classification of signed and spoken narratives

Suprasegmental changes in speaker-signers' speech may be an important component of the results obtained in key-word-sign programs. The aim of this study was to investigate whether untrained listeners could tell a difference between the speech of a person using key word signing with speech and using speech only. Fifty untrained listeners heard an audiotape of six speaker-signers who sometimes used key word signing and sometimes used speech only in their production of 24 spoken narratives. The results demonstrated that listeners could accurately classify all keyword-signed communication of three speaker-signers and the spoken-only communication of all four speaker-signers who had been previously identified as demonstrating natural spoken communication. The major perceived differences between the use of key-word-signed communication and spoken-only communication were differences in speech rate and word emphasis and differences in pausing.