The effect of temporal speech alterations on speaker height and weight identification.

Abstract

The purpose of this investigation was to determine the importance of temporal features of speech in speaker height and weight identification. A total of 30 speakers, 15 females and 15 males, recorded a standard prose passage. Three master tapes were constructed from these recordings, representing the three experimental conditions in the study: forward-played, backward-played, and time-compressed tapes. A total of 32 judges participated in three sessions, one for each of the three experimental conditions. In each session they were asked to make direct estimations of the height and weight of each speaker. The order of presentation of the three tapes was counterbalanced. Results indicate that temporal alteration of the speech signal by means of backward-playing adversely affected listener judgments of height and weight. However, time compression of the speech signal did not appear to have a significant effect on listener accuracy. Implications of these findings and suggestions for future research are discussed.