Acoustic screening for vocal pathology with a boltzmann machine

The measurement of pitch perturbation has been used in acoustic screening for the detection of vocal disorders. As an alternative to applying conventional statistical techniques to the pitch perturbation parameters used for Separation of control and pathological speakers, a parallel distributed processing model approach has been implemented using a Boltzmann Machine (BM). After training, the machine is able to separate the two groups and to classify the vocal disorders present in the pathological group of speakers. The connections developed by the Boltzmann Machine have also given some insights into the usefulness of each of the perturbation parameters employed.