The Influence of Persian Language on Khoramabadi Luri Vowels Quality for Forensic Analysis

Abstract

Using forensic analysis, this study attempted to investigate the influence of the Persian language on the quality of Khoramabadi Luri vowels. This research tried to find the answer to whether Persian can affect the acoustic features of Khoramabadi vowels or not. To do so, data from 20 Khoramabadi Lur participants (10 males, 10 females) were recorded; the first group of whom lived in Khoramabad and the second group lived in Tehran. 54 sentences including the selected words were read by participants. The total number of phonetic sample tokens analyzed was 3240, including /ɑ, y, ø, o, u, ə, a, e, ʏ, ɪ, i/ vowels. Phonetic samples were analyzed phonetically and statistically. The acoustic parameters, fundamental frequency, and the first formant frequency to the fifth formant frequency were chosen. Data analysis showed that fundamental frequency, fifth formant frequency, third formant frequency, and by a wide margin second formant frequency had the highest capacity to distinguish Luri samples articulated by male speakers who lived in Tehran and Khoramabad. For female speakers, only fundamental frequency and by a wide margin, the fifth formant frequency of Khoramabadi Luri had this capacity. As a result, fundamental frequency and higher formant frequencies had the highest capacity to distinguish the speakers.

Keywords

• forensic phonetics
• voice profiling
• fundamental frequency
• formant frequencies
• khoram abadi luri