Three mechanisms for modeling articulation: selection, coordination, and intention

A conceptual framework for modeling articulatory control is presented in a tutorial fashion. The framework incorporates three mechanisms: selection, coordination, and intention.

• Selection is a mechanism for governing the choice and ordering of articulatory movements, and operates through an activation code.
• Coordination is a mechanism for governing the control of movement timing in precise manner, and operates through a phase code regulated by coupled oscillators.
• Intention is a mechanism for determining the target state of the vocal tract, and operates through a spatial code derived from integrating over parameter fields.

All three mechanisms are inherently dynamic, and their interactions provide a basis for understanding a wide variety of phonetic and phonological patterns in development and across languages.

An integrated model of the mechanisms is described and applied to a range of empirical phenomena.