Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jul 12, 2025
Foreign Accent and Forensic Speaker Identification in Voice Lineups: The Influence of Acoustic Features Based on Prosody
Published on: September 27, 2024
Evaluating the Effect of Voice Quality Covariance on Auditory-Perceptual Evaluation Using a Novel Two-Dimensional
Supraja Anand1, Yeonggwang Park2, Rahul Shrivastav3
1Department of Communication Sciences & Disorders, University of South Florida, Tampa.
Purpose:
Most people with dysphonia present with voices that vary along more than one voice quality (VQ) dimension. This study sought to examine the effect of covariance between breathy and rough VQ in natural voices.
Method:
A two-dimensional matrix of 16 /a/ vowels was selected such that two VQ dimensions (breathiness and roughness) were sampled on a 4-point severity scale (none, mild, moderate, and severe). Ten listeners evaluated 480 stimuli (16 stimuli × 10 repetitions × 3 blocks) on one-dimensional magnitude estimation (1DME) tasks and a novel two-dimensional magnitude estimation (2DME) task that allowed for simultaneous measurement of breathiness and roughness.
Results:
Data indicated high intra- and interrater reliabilities for both breathiness and roughness in the 2DME and 1DME tasks. Correlation analyses revealed a strong correlation between 2DME and 1DME judgments for breathiness and roughness (r > .95). There was also a minimal correlation between breathy and rough VQ in the 2DME task (r < .10).
Conclusions:
Covarying roughness or breathiness had less impact on the perception of the other VQ in natural dysphonic voices in 2DME compared to 1DME. An understanding and quantification of the perceptual interactions among the dimensions will aid in the refinement of computational models and in the establishment of the validity of clinical scales for VQ perception.
Related Concept Videos
01:21Perceiving Loudness, Pitch, and Location
Place theory, or place coding, suggests that different pitches are heard because various sound waves activate specific locations along the cochlea's basilar membrane. The brain determines the pitch of a sound by...
01:17Auditory Perception
01:25Factors Affecting Perception
An illustrative example of a perceptual set is the scenario where an airline pilot told...
01:01Perception of Sound Waves
The pitch of a sound depends on the frequency and the pressure amplitude of the source. Two sounds of the same...
01:26Unsoundness of Aggregate due to Volume Change
01:12Perceptual Constancy
Size constancy is the recognition that an object remains the same size, even when its image on the retina changes. For instance, a bus is perceived to be large enough to carry people, even if it looks tiny from...