Abstract
Smiling is a universally recognized visible expression of happiness. A side effect of smiling is an alteration of the vocal tract, suggesting that during vocalization smiling may be heard as well as seen. The present studies investigated this hypothesis. Smiled and straight-faced tokens of 29 utterances were collected from six speakers, and presented to three groups of 12 subjects for forced-choice identification. Groups 1 and 2, instructed to select the. smiled or happier sound, respectively, performed significantly better than chance for all speakers. Group 3, asked to select the sadder sound, chose the straight-faced token reliably :For four speakers, but for one also picked the smiled token. Acoustic analyses showed that smiling raised the fundamental and formant frequencies for all speakers and amplitude and/or duration for some. Particular cue combinations appear to be heard as smiling specifically, whereas others are associated with emotionality in general.
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Disclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.