Taleproduktion

Taleproduktion, or speech production, is the cognitive and neural process by which a speaker converts a message into spoken utterances. It involves planning at multiple levels—conceptualization, lexical selection, grammatical encoding, and phonological encoding—and the subsequent motor realization of linguistic plans as articulatory gestures. The typical sequence is conceptualization, formulation, phonological encoding, and articulation, but production is interactive and relies on feedback from auditory and somatosensory systems. Prosody, intonation, stress, and rhythm are integrated features that convey meaning and structure and are planned together with segmental content.

Neural substrates span frontal and temporal cortex, basal ganglia, and cerebellum. Classical models associate language planning with Broca’s area in the left inferior frontal gyrus and comprehension with Wernicke’s area in the superior temporal gyrus, linked by the arcuate fasciculus. Motor planning and execution involve the premotor and primary motor cortices, brainstem pathways, and the cerebellum, which support timing and coordination of articulatory movements. Speech production is studied with behavioral tasks, acoustic analysis, and neuroimaging techniques such as fMRI and PET, as well as electrophysiological methods.

Clinical relevance includes disorders such as apraxia of speech, dysarthria, and aphasia, which affect planning, articulation, or coordination. Developmentally, children acquire lexical access, phonological representations, and motor control over several years, with cross-linguistic differences in phonology and prosody shaping the trajectory of development and language use.