Abstract
We explored how experimentally induced psychological stress affects the production and recognition of vocal emotions. In Study 1a, we demonstrate that sentences spoken by stressed speakers are judged by naïve listeners as sounding more stressed than sentences uttered by non-stressed speakers. In Study 1b, negative emotions produced by stressed speakers are generally less well recognized than the same emotions produced by non-stressed speakers. Multiple mediation analyses suggest this poorer recognition of negative stimuli was due to a mismatch between the variation of volume voiced by speakers and the range of volume expected by listeners. Together, this suggests that the stress level of the speaker affects judgments made by the receiver. In Study 2, we demonstrate that participants who were induced with a feeling of stress before carrying out an emotional prosody recognition task performed worse than non-stressed participants. Overall, findings suggest detrimental effects of induced stress on interpersonal sensitivity.
Highlights
In his novel Player One, Douglas Coupland nicely outlines one of the most challenging social communication issues: “Life is often a question of tone: what you hear inside your head vs. what people end up reading or hearing from your mouth” [1]
In Study 2, we demonstrate that participants who were induced with a feeling of stress before carrying out an emotional prosody recognition task performed worse than non-stressed participants
This study aimed to explore whether emotional prosody recognition is more difficult for materials spoken by stressed speakers as opposed to non-stressed speakers
Summary
In his novel Player One, Douglas Coupland nicely outlines one of the most challenging social communication issues: “Life is often a question of tone: what you hear inside your head vs. what people end up reading or hearing from your mouth” [1]. The present research set out to explore the effects of laboratory induced stress on emotional prosody from both the sender and receiver perspective using a modified version of the Brunswik [5] lens model introduced by Juslin and Scherer [6] as a theoretical framework. This approach allows systematic exploration of the relationship between acoustic cues used by the sender and perceived by the listener. In this research, ‘stress’ is loosely defined as a state of the organism in which its “internal balance” is disturbed, demanding “an adaptive coping response to restore
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: 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.
