AN EXPERIMENTAL-STUDY OF BREATHING IN SPO NTANEOUS SPEECH

The breathing patterns of two speakers engaging in a spontaneous conve rsation were studied. The variations observed in duration and air flow on inspiratory and expiratory phases indicated the following: Two of the factors which determine respiratory rhythm during speech are inspi red air volume and expiration duration. The pragmatic constraints of d ialogue constitute genuine constraints, such that the speaker's breath ing is adapted to the dialogue rather than the dialogue being adapted to the breathing. No respiratory evidence was found to support the hyp othesis of verbal unit (<<sentence>>) preprogramming. On the contrary, the close relationship between conversational phenomena and respirato ry phenomena indicates that there are no complete verbal units in dial ogue.