1. A speaker independent apparatus for word recognition comprising: a) input means for inputting an utterance by an unspecified person into an electrical signal; b) characteristic extracting means for receiving the electrical signal from the input means and converting the electrical signal into a time series of discrete characteristic multidimensional vectors; c) phoneme recognition means for selectively receiving the time series of discrete characteristic multidimensional vectors and converting each of said selectively received vectors into a plurality of candidates of phonemes from a first order to an n-th order (n denotes an arbitrary number); d) word recognition means for receiving a time series string of phonemes from the phoneme recognition means and comparing the plurality of candidates of phonemes, one at a time, with each phoneme of a reference string of phonemes for words previously stored in a dictionary until a final phoneme of the reference string of phonemes for a last word of the words stored in the dictionary and determining a time series of phonemes derived from said phoneme recognition means having a highest similarity to one of the reference strings of the phonemes for the words stored in the dictionary using a predetermined word matching technique; e) output means for outputting at least one of said candidates of phonemes as a result of word recognition carried out by the word recognition means on the basis of a similarity determination on the plurality of candidates of phonemes with respect to the reference strings of the words stored in said dictionary; and f) selecting means, interposed between said characteristic extracting means and phoneme recognition means, for selecting a center of a given number of frames of a continued time-series of discrete characteristic multidimensional vectors derived from said characteristic extracting means so that said phoneme recognition means receives the center thereof.
1. A speaker independent apparatus for word recognition comprising: a) input means for inputting an utterance by an unspecified person into an electrical signal; b) characteristic extracting means for receiving the electrical signal from the input means and converting the electrical signal into a time series of discrete characteristic multidimensional vectors; c) phoneme recognition means for selectively receiving the time series of discrete characteristic multidimensional vectors and converting each of said selectively received vectors into a plurality of candidates of phonemes from a first order to an n-th order (n denotes an arbitrary number); d) word recognition means for receiving a time series string of phonemes from the phoneme recognition means and comparing the plurality of candidates of phonemes, one at a time, with each phoneme of a reference string of phonemes for words previously stored in a dictionary until a final phoneme of the reference string of phonemes for a last word of the words stored in the dictionary and determining a time series of phonemes derived from said phoneme recognition means having a highest similarity to one of the reference strings of the phonemes for the words stored in the dictionary using a predetermined word matching technique; e) output means for outputting at least one of said candidates of phonemes as a result of word recognition carried out by the word recognition means on the basis of a similarity determination on the plurality of candidates of phonemes with respect to the reference strings of the words stored in said dictionary; and f) selecting means, interposed between said characteristic extracting means and phoneme recognition means, for selecting a center of a given number of frames of a continued time-series of discrete characteristic multidimensional vectors derived from said characteristic extracting means so that said phoneme recognition means receives the center thereof. 3. An apparatus as set forth in claim 1, wherein said predetermined word matching technique, of said word recognition means, is a Dynamic Time Warping (DTW) technique, having an accumulated distance g(i, j) from a time i of the input string of phonemes in the time series to a time j of the reference string of phonemes stored in one of memory areas of the dictionary and calculated using an intervector distance d(i, j) from one of the phonemes of the input string of the phonemes at the item i to one of the phonemes of the reference string of phonemes at the time j; g(i, j)=min {g(i-1, j), g (i-1, j-1), g (i-1, j-2)}+d (i, j), such that 1) if one of the phonemes of the reference string of the phonemes coincides with a corresponding order one of the phonemes of the input string of the phonemes of the first order of candidates, the intervector distance is 0; 2) if one of the phonemes of the reference string of phonemes does not coincide with the corresponding order of the phonemes of the input string of the phonemes of the first order of the candidates but coincides with the corresponding order phoneme of the phonemes of a second order of candidates, the intervector distance is 1; and 3) in other cases, the intervector distance is 2, at least one path minimizing the accumulated distance is prepared, and a minimum path is derived from the paths prepared for each reference string of phonemes constituting the respective words, the word having the reference string of phonemes with the minimum path to the corresponding input string of the phonemes being output as the result of word recognition.