Quantifying Nasality in Arabic Speakers: Preliminary Data

Abstract

This paper aimed to establish preliminary normative data scores of nasalance value for the Arab Emirati speakers, and to compare them to other Arabic speakers, particularly the Saudi, Jordanian and Egyptian speakers. Design was a cross-sectional study where nasality scores (nasalance percentages) were obtained under oral and vowel passage tasks. Participants were 104 Emirati individuals (54 males, age range 18-27, and 50 females, age range 18-27). Each participant was asked to extend the /a:/ vowel and read a passage in Arabic. A nasometer model II, 6450 (KayPentax, Canada) was utilized for nasalance scores computation. The ANOVA revealed no significant differences between the female and male Emirati speakers’ nasalance scores in both the vowel (males= 26.35, females= 23.3) and the oral passage tasks (males= 15, females= 15.1). The Emirati speakers had higher nasalance scores than the Saudi speakers in both tasks, and in the /a:/vowel task compared to the Egyptian and Jordanian speakers. Language and dialect are two important variables in determining the nasalance normative scores..