Perception of speech rate in speech rate perception

Abstract

This study investigates what influences a listener’s perception of speech rate. Three factors were investigated: pause type, actual speech rate, and utterance type (native, accented, and unfamiliar). Using manually accelerated vs. decelerated but structurally-identical sentences with three-type pauses (long, short, and filled) in accented, native, and unfamiliar language (Spanish) utterances, a group of Arabic speakers judged whether the sentences they heard were slow or fast, and rated the speed on a 1-7 scale (1 = slow, 7 = fast). The findings show that long pauses triggered lower ratings, while filled pauses achieved ratings higher than both long and short pauses. Unfamiliar language received the highest ratings while the accented speech received the lowest. This suggests that, regardless of actual speech rate, silent pauses affect our perception of speech rate, and that when the duration of silence differs, our perception of speech rate will differ accordingly. The results also show that we tend to th...