Measuring tongue movements during speech: Adaptation of a magnetic jaw-tracking system

The purpose of the present investigation was to determine whether measurements of tongue movement during speech could be obtained with an electronic device originally designed to record jaw movements via a magnetized pellet. The findings indicated that the system allowed basic quantification of tongue movements in a straightforward manner. The primary advantages of this system are that no distracting wires are attached to the pellet, and it is much less costly than other systems used for this purpose. Its main disadvantages are that it is unable to track multiple tongue fleshpoints simultaneously, lacks an anatomically based coordinate system, and the head must remain still during recordings.