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Updated: May 5, 2026
Author Spotlight: Investigating the Impact of Emotional Prosodies on Voice Recognition and Perception
Published on: August 9, 2024
Acoustic Assumptions (AA): A Retrospective Study of an Approach to Optimizing Personal Resonance Goals in
Sandy Hirsch1, Brett R Myers2, Shaheen N Awan3
1Give Voice (Private Practice), Seattle, Washington.
Purpose:
The purpose of this study was to investigate the hypothesis that the Acoustic Assumptions (AA) approach is associated with acoustic, listener, and client-reported changes that align with the client's voice gender goals.
Method:
Pretherapy and post therapy samples of the vowels /a/, /i/, and /u/, the first three sentences of the Rainbow Passage, and self-perception questionnaires (Trans Woman Voice Questionnaire (TWVQ) and Voice-related Experiences of Nonbinary Individuals (VENI)) were analyzed for 15 transgender and gender-diverse (TGD) clients. In addition, speech-language pathology (SLP) students made blind, randomized ratings to measure gender perception of acoustic samples and to assess any perceptual change pre and post therapy.
Results:
Significant increases in post treatment F0 and F2 were observed in vowels /i/, /a/, and /u/, coinciding with significant posttreatment increases in vowel space area (VSA) and significant decreases in estimated vocal tract length (VTL). Significant increases in F0 and F2 in the vowel /a/ were also observed. Regression analyses showed that the treatment difference in (a) sustained vowel F0 and F2 and (b) sustained vowel F0 and F1 combined to significantly predict the treatment difference in listener-perceived femininity ratings in vowel contexts and sentence contexts, respectively, while treatment difference in sustained vowel F2 was observed to predict a treatment difference in the TWVQ self-rating.
Conclusions:
This study provides the first analysis of treatment outcomes using the AA approach to GAVT. AA is a systematic approach to resonance modification, and the current data show that it leads to significant changes in F0 and vowel formants (particularly F2). For clients with feminizing goals, the approach is associated with a more feminine-sounding voice and more positive voice-related experiences in daily living. These findings suggest that AA may be a valuable gender-affirming approach to voice training.
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