Perception of femininity in normally phonated and whispered speech

Abstract

Many transgender women seek out voice and communication therapy to support in their transition from their biological gender to presenting as their gender identity. This has led to an increased need to examine the perception of gender and femininity to develop evidence-based therapy practices. In this study, we explored perception of femininity in normally phonated and whispered speech. Transgender male-to-female, cismale, and cisfemale speakers were recorded producing hVd words. Naïve listeners rated femininity using a visual-analog scale. The results revealed that listeners rated speakers more ambiguously in whispered speech than normally phonated speech. Within-group analyses were conducted to further examine how speaker characteristics (height, age, mean f0, duration) contributed to perceptions of femininity. While there was a significant effect of mean f0 within the normally phonated condition for all groups, none of the other speaker or acoustic cues consistently predicted listener ratings of femininity across speaker groups.