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The speech lab provides services and facilities to all researchers (including students) who need to do experiments with human participants, like the one above. The services and facilities are generally free for researchers and students, but if you have a large grant it is mandatory that you contribute financially to both, so if you are planning to apply for a research grant that involves using the lab, please contact the scientific director before starting to draw up a budget (for more details, see financing).
The speech lab of the University of Amsterdam was first set up by the phoneticians in 1933, then reinstalled at new locations in 1966, 2006, 2016 and 2022. The present speech lab is located on the ground floor of the Bushuis (Kloveniersburgwal 48) in rooms F0.21 and F0.21A (behind the porter), and is currently part of the UvA Humanities Labs under the name “Speech Lab” or “Spraaklab”.
The speech lab is managed by electronic and speech engineer Dirk Jan Vet, who guides the researchers in their quest for optimal implementation of their experiments and supervises the lab manager(s) and any research assistants. The tasks of the lab managers (currently Marloes Roosingh and Ray Pelupessy) is to test human participants, to annotate recordings, to analyze data, and to generally help researchers and participants in all kinds of matters. The scientific director of the lab is Paul Boersma, who is responsible for general guidance, finances, and this website.
You will generally need help from Dirk if you want to use any of the facilities below: he will set up the experiment with you and teach you how to work with the device on your own. Because Dirk is an electronic engineer, he can also build complex configurations that combine multiple facilities, if your research question is well served by such a combination.
The speech lab is equipped with:
If you want to use any of these lab facilities, you can look into the calendar for when there are free time slots. For obtaining a license to reserve lab hours, contact technician Dirk Jan Vet. Usually, however, you will need technical support from Dirk, especially if you want to combine multiple of these facilities, e.g. if your research question is helped by combining EEG, eye-tracking, video, audio, vocal reactions and mouse clicks in a synchronized manner.
Researchers that you can find in the speech lab are mainly the UvA phoneticians, other members of the linguistics research institute ACLC, and sometimes members of the interfacultary research institute ILLC. The lab also occasionally hosts other researchers from the Faculty of Humanities (e.g. literature researchers and musicologists) and the University (e.g. developmental psychologists), and researchers from other universities.
The speech lab is generally managed by technician Dirk Jan Vet. For discussing how the lab will fit into your future grant proposal (which could have to finance new facilities and/or to help financing the services), contact the scientific director Paul Boersma before starting to draw up a budget. See financing for details.