Aging speech: Physiological and sociological aspects

Abstract

It is generally accepted that listeners are able to accurately classify a speech sample according to the chronological age of the speaker (Ptacek and Sander, 1966; Shipp and Hollien, 1969; Ryan and Burk, 1974; Ryan and Capadano, 1978). Impressive listener accuracy has been reported in age ratings of both connected speech (Ptacek and Sander, 1966) and sustained vowel phonation (Shipp and Hollien, 1969; Linville and Fisher, 1980). Findings such as these suggest the acoustic characteristics of speech change with advancing age (Kent and Burkard, 1981) and that listeners use certain of these acoustic characteristics in their judgments of age. For example, sustained vowel phonation of the elderly has been described perceptually as hoarse, breathy and tremorous (Ptacek and Sander, 1966; Hartman and Danhauer, 1976; Ryan and Capadano, 1978); acoustic analyses of such sustained phonation have revealed increases in fundamental frequency, jitter, shimmer and spectral noise (Wilcox and Horii, 1980; Ramig and Ringel, 1983; Ramig, 1983a). Connected speech of the elderly has been reported to be slow, have long pauses and hesitancy and be less clear (Ptacek and Sander, 1966; Hartman and Danhauer, 1976); acoustic analyses of such speech reveal increased silent time, longer pauses and increased duration of phonemes (Mysak, 1959; Hoflien and Shipp, 1972; Hartman and Danhauer, 1976; Schow ef al., 1978).