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Ozaki Y, Tierney A, Pfordresher PQ, McBride JM, Benetos E, Proutskova P, Chiba G, Liu F, Jacoby N, Purdy SC, Opondo P, Fitch WT, Hegde S, Rocamora M, Thorne R, Nweke F, Sadaphal DP, Sadaphal PM, Hadavi S, Fujii S, Choo S, Naruse M, Ehara U, Sy L, Parselelo ML, Anglada-Tort M, Hansen NC, Haiduk F, Færøvik U, Magalhães V, Krzyżanowski W, Shcherbakova O, Hereld D, Barbosa BS, Varella MAC, van Tongeren M, Dessiatnitchenko P, Zar SZ, El Kahla I, Muslu O, Troy J, Lomsadze T, Kurdova D, Tsope C, Fredriksson D, Arabadjiev A, Sarbah JP, Arhine A, Meachair TÓ, Silva-Zurita J, Soto-Silva I, Millalonco NEM, Ambrazevičius R, Loui P, Ravignani A, Jadoul Y, Larrouy-Maestri P, Bruder C, Teyxokawa TP, Kuikuro U, Natsitsabui R, Sagarzazu NB, Raviv L, Zeng M, Varnosfaderani SD, Gómez-Cañón JS, Kolff K, der Nederlanden CVB, Chhatwal M, David RM, Setiawan IPG, Lekakul G, Borsan VN, Nguqu N, Savage PE. Globally, songs and instrumental melodies are slower and higher and use more stable pitches than speech: A Registered Report. SCIENCE ADVANCES 2024; 10:eadm9797. [PMID: 38748798 PMCID: PMC11095461 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adm9797] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/15/2023] [Accepted: 04/19/2024] [Indexed: 05/19/2024]
Abstract
Both music and language are found in all known human societies, yet no studies have compared similarities and differences between song, speech, and instrumental music on a global scale. In this Registered Report, we analyzed two global datasets: (i) 300 annotated audio recordings representing matched sets of traditional songs, recited lyrics, conversational speech, and instrumental melodies from our 75 coauthors speaking 55 languages; and (ii) 418 previously published adult-directed song and speech recordings from 209 individuals speaking 16 languages. Of our six preregistered predictions, five were strongly supported: Relative to speech, songs use (i) higher pitch, (ii) slower temporal rate, and (iii) more stable pitches, while both songs and speech used similar (iv) pitch interval size and (v) timbral brightness. Exploratory analyses suggest that features vary along a "musi-linguistic" continuum when including instrumental melodies and recited lyrics. Our study provides strong empirical evidence of cross-cultural regularities in music and speech.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yuto Ozaki
- Graduate School of Media and Governance, Keio University, Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Japan
| | - Adam Tierney
- Department of Psychological Sciences, Birkbeck, University of London, London, UK
| | - Peter Q. Pfordresher
- Department of Psychology, University at Buffalo, State University of New York, Buffalo, NY, USA
| | - John M. McBride
- Center for Algorithmic and Robotized Synthesis, Institute for Basic Science, Ulsan, South Korea
| | - Emmanouil Benetos
- School of Electronic Engineering and Computer Science, Queen Mary University of London, London, UK
| | - Polina Proutskova
- School of Electronic Engineering and Computer Science, Queen Mary University of London, London, UK
| | - Gakuto Chiba
- Graduate School of Media and Governance, Keio University, Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Japan
| | - Fang Liu
- School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences, University of Reading, Reading, UK
| | - Nori Jacoby
- Computational Auditory Perception Group, Max-Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics, Frankfurt am Main, Germany
| | - Suzanne C. Purdy
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
- Centre for Brain Research and Eisdell Moore Centre for Hearing and Balance Research, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Patricia Opondo
- School of Arts, Music Discipline, University of KwaZulu Natal, Durban, South Africa
| | - W. Tecumseh Fitch
- Department of Behavioral and Cognitive Biology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria
| | - Shantala Hegde
- Music Cognition Lab, Department of Clinical Psychology, National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences, Bangalore, Karnataka, India
| | - Martín Rocamora
- Universidad de la República, Montevideo, Uruguay
- Music Technology Group, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain
| | - Rob Thorne
- School of Music, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand
| | - Florence Nweke
- Department of Creative Arts, University of Lagos, Lagos, Nigeria
- Department of Music, Mountain Top University, Ogun, Nigeria
| | - Dhwani P. Sadaphal
- Department of Behavioral and Cognitive Biology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria
| | | | - Shafagh Hadavi
- Graduate School of Media and Governance, Keio University, Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Japan
| | - Shinya Fujii
- Faculty of Environment and Information Studies, Keio University, Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Japan
| | - Sangbuem Choo
- Graduate School of Media and Governance, Keio University, Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Japan
| | - Marin Naruse
- Faculty of Policy Management, Keio University, Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Japan
| | | | - Latyr Sy
- Independent researcher, Tokyo, Japan
- Independent researcher, Dakar, Sénégal
| | - Mark Lenini Parselelo
- Memorial University of Newfoundland, St. John’s, NL, Canada
- Department of Music and Dance, Kenyatta University, Nairobi, Kenya
| | | | - Niels Chr. Hansen
- Aarhus Institute of Advanced Studies, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark
- Centre of Excellence in Music, Mind, Body and Brain, University of Jyväskylä, Jyväskylä, Finland
- Interacting Minds Centre, School of Culture and Society, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark
- Royal Academy of Music Aarhus/Aalborg, Aarhus, Denmark
| | - Felix Haiduk
- Department of Behavioral and Cognitive Biology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria
- Department of General Psychology, University of Padua, Padua, Italy
| | - Ulvhild Færøvik
- Institute of Biological and Medical Psychology, Department of Psychology, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway
| | - Violeta Magalhães
- Centre of Linguistics of the University of Porto (CLUP), Porto, Portugal
- Faculty of Arts and Humanities of the University of Porto (FLUP), Porto, Portugal
- School of Education of the Polytechnic of Porto (ESE IPP), Porto, Portugal
| | - Wojciech Krzyżanowski
- Adam Mickiewicz University, Faculty of Art Studies, Musicology Institute, Poznań, Poland
| | | | - Diana Hereld
- Department of Psychiatry, UCLA Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | | | | | | | | | - Su Zar Zar
- Headmistress, The Royal Music Academy, Yangon, Myanmar
| | - Iyadh El Kahla
- Department of Cultural Policy, University of Hildesheim, Hildesheim, Germany
| | - Olcay Muslu
- Centre for the Study of Higher Education, University of Kent, Canterbury, UK
- MIRAS, Centre for Cultural Sustainability, Istanbul, Turkey
| | - Jakelin Troy
- Director, Indigenous Research, Office of the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research); Department of Linguistics, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, The University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia
| | - Teona Lomsadze
- International Research Center for Traditional Polyphony of the Tbilisi State Conservatoire, Tbilisi, Georgia
- Georgian Studies Fellow, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK
| | - Dilyana Kurdova
- South-West University Neofit Rilski, Blagoevgrad, Bulgaria
- Phoenix Perpeticum Foundation, Sofia, Bulgaria
| | | | | | - Aleksandar Arabadjiev
- Department of Folk Music Research and Ethnomusicology, University of Music and Performing Arts–MDW, Wien, Austria
| | | | - Adwoa Arhine
- Department of Music, University of Ghana, Accra, Ghana
| | - Tadhg Ó Meachair
- Department of Ethnomusicology and Folklore, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, USA
| | - Javier Silva-Zurita
- Department of Humanities and Arts, University of Los Lagos, Osorno, Chile
- Millennium Nucleus on Musical and Sound Cultures (CMUS NCS 2022-16), Santiago, Chile
| | - Ignacio Soto-Silva
- Department of Humanities and Arts, University of Los Lagos, Osorno, Chile
- Millennium Nucleus on Musical and Sound Cultures (CMUS NCS 2022-16), Santiago, Chile
| | | | | | - Psyche Loui
- Music, Imaging and Neural Dynamics Lab, Northeastern University, Boston, MA, USA
| | - Andrea Ravignani
- Department of Human Neurosciences, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy
- Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, Netherlands
- Center for Music in the Brain, Department of Clinical Medicine, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark & The Royal Academy of Music Aarhus/Aalborg, Aarhus, Denmark
| | - Yannick Jadoul
- Department of Human Neurosciences, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy
- Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, Netherlands
| | - Pauline Larrouy-Maestri
- Music Department, Max-Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics, Frankfurt am Main, Germany
- Max Planck—NYU Center for Language, Music, and Emotion (CLaME), New York, NY, USA
| | - Camila Bruder
- Music Department, Max-Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics, Frankfurt am Main, Germany
| | - Tutushamum Puri Teyxokawa
- Txemim Puri Project–Puri Language Research, Vitalization and Teaching/Recording and Preservation of Puri History and Culture, Rio de Janeiro, Brasil
| | | | | | | | - Limor Raviv
- Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, Netherlands
- cSCAN, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, UK
| | - Minyu Zeng
- Graduate School of Media and Governance, Keio University, Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Japan
- Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI, USA
| | - Shahaboddin Dabaghi Varnosfaderani
- Institute for English and American Studies (IEAS), Goethe University of Frankfurt am Main, Frankfurt am Main, Germany
- Cognitive and Developmental Psychology Unit, Centre, for Cognitive Science, University of Kaiserslautern-Landau (RPTU), Kaiserslautern, Germany
| | | | - Kayla Kolff
- Institute of Cognitive Science, University of Osnabrück, Osnabrück, Germany
| | | | - Meyha Chhatwal
- Department of Psychology, University of Toronto Mississauga, Mississauga, ON, Canada
| | - Ryan Mark David
- Department of Psychology, University of Toronto Mississauga, Mississauga, ON, Canada
| | | | - Great Lekakul
- Faculty of Fine Arts, Chiang Mai University, Chiang Mai, Thailand
| | - Vanessa Nina Borsan
- Graduate School of Media and Governance, Keio University, Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Japan
- Université de Lille, CNRS, Centrale Lille, UMR 9189 CRIStAL, F-59000 Lille, France
| | - Nozuko Nguqu
- School of Arts, Music Discipline, University of KwaZulu Natal, Durban, South Africa
| | - Patrick E. Savage
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
- Faculty of Environment and Information Studies, Keio University, Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Japan
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Bruder C, Poeppel D, Larrouy-Maestri P. Perceptual (but not acoustic) features predict singing voice preferences. Sci Rep 2024; 14:8977. [PMID: 38637516 PMCID: PMC11026466 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-024-58924-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/07/2023] [Accepted: 04/03/2024] [Indexed: 04/20/2024] Open
Abstract
Why do we prefer some singers to others? We investigated how much singing voice preferences can be traced back to objective features of the stimuli. To do so, we asked participants to rate short excerpts of singing performances in terms of how much they liked them as well as in terms of 10 perceptual attributes (e.g.: pitch accuracy, tempo, breathiness). We modeled liking ratings based on these perceptual ratings, as well as based on acoustic features and low-level features derived from Music Information Retrieval (MIR). Mean liking ratings for each stimulus were highly correlated between Experiments 1 (online, US-based participants) and 2 (in the lab, German participants), suggesting a role for attributes of the stimuli in grounding average preferences. We show that acoustic and MIR features barely explain any variance in liking ratings; in contrast, perceptual features of the voices achieved around 43% of prediction. Inter-rater agreement in liking and perceptual ratings was low, indicating substantial (and unsurprising) individual differences in participants' preferences and perception of the stimuli. Our results indicate that singing voice preferences are not grounded in acoustic attributes of the voices per se, but in how these features are perceptually interpreted by listeners.
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Affiliation(s)
- Camila Bruder
- Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics, Frankfurt am Main, Germany.
| | - David Poeppel
- New York University, New York, NY, USA
- Ernst Strüngmann Institute for Neuroscience, Frankfurt, Germany
- Max Planck-NYU Center for Language, Music, and Emotion (CLaME), New York, USA
| | - Pauline Larrouy-Maestri
- Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics, Frankfurt am Main, Germany
- Max Planck-NYU Center for Language, Music, and Emotion (CLaME), New York, USA
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Marin MM, Gingras B. How music-induced emotions affect sexual attraction: evolutionary implications. Front Psychol 2024; 15:1269820. [PMID: 38659690 PMCID: PMC11039867 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1269820] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/30/2023] [Accepted: 03/29/2024] [Indexed: 04/26/2024] Open
Abstract
More than a century ago, Darwin proposed a putative role for music in sexual attraction (i.e., sex appeal), a hypothesis that has recently gained traction in the field of music psychology. In his writings, Darwin particularly emphasized the charming aspects of music. Across a broad range of cultures, music has a profound impact on humans' feelings, thoughts and behavior. Human mate choice is determined by the interplay of several factors. A number of studies have shown that music and musicality (i.e., the ability to produce and enjoy music) exert a positive influence on the evaluation of potential sexual partners. Here, we critically review the latest empirical literature on how and why music and musicality affect sexual attraction by considering the role of music-induced emotion and arousal in listeners as well as other socio-biological mechanisms. Following a short overview of current theories about the origins of musicality, we present studies that examine the impact of music and musicality on sexual attraction in different social settings. We differentiate between emotion-based influences related to the subjective experience of music as sound and effects associated with perceived musical ability or creativity in a potential partner. By integrating studies using various behavioral methods, we link current research strands that investigate how music influences sexual attraction and suggest promising avenues for future research.
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Affiliation(s)
- Manuela M. Marin
- Department of Cognition, Emotion and Methods in Psychology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria
- Austrian Research Institute of Empirical Aesthetics, Innsbruck, Austria
| | - Bruno Gingras
- Austrian Research Institute of Empirical Aesthetics, Innsbruck, Austria
- Department of Cognitive Biology, Faculty of Life Sciences, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria
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Keller PE, Lee J, König R, Novembre G. Sex-related communicative functions of voice spectral energy in human chorusing. Biol Lett 2023; 19:20230326. [PMID: 37935372 PMCID: PMC10645082 DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2023.0326] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/12/2023] [Accepted: 10/16/2023] [Indexed: 11/09/2023] Open
Abstract
Music is a human communicative art whose evolutionary origins may lie in capacities that support cooperation and/or competition. A mixed account favouring simultaneous cooperation and competition draws on analogous interactive displays produced by collectively signalling non-human animals (e.g. crickets and frogs). In these displays, rhythmically coordinated calls serve as a beacon whereby groups of males 'cooperatively' attract potential female mates, while the likelihood of each male competitively attracting an actual mate depends on the precedence of his signal. Human behaviour consistent with the mixed account was previously observed in a renowned boys choir, where the basses-the oldest boys with the deepest voices-boosted their acoustic prominence by increasing energy in a high-frequency band of the vocal spectrum when girls were in an otherwise male audience. The current study tested female and male sensitivity and preferences for this subtle vocal modulation in online listening tasks. Results indicate that while female and male listeners are similarly sensitive to enhanced high-spectral energy elicited by the presence of girls in the audience, only female listeners exhibit a reliable preference for it. Findings suggest that human chorusing is a flexible form of social communicative behaviour that allows simultaneous group cohesion and sexually motivated competition.
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Affiliation(s)
- Peter E. Keller
- Center for Music in the Brain, Department of Clinical Medicine, Aarhus University, Aarhus 8000, Denmark
- The MARCS Institute for Brain, Behaviour and Development, Western Sydney University, Penrith South, Australia
| | - Jennifer Lee
- Queensland Aphasia Research Centre, University of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
| | | | - Giacomo Novembre
- Neuroscience of Perception and Action Lab, Italian Institute of Technology, Rome, Italy
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Varella MAC. Nocturnal selective pressures on the evolution of human musicality as a missing piece of the adaptationist puzzle. Front Psychol 2023; 14:1215481. [PMID: 37860295 PMCID: PMC10582961 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1215481] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/02/2023] [Accepted: 09/11/2023] [Indexed: 10/21/2023] Open
Abstract
Human musicality exhibits the necessary hallmarks for biological adaptations. Evolutionary explanations focus on recurrent adaptive problems that human musicality possibly solved in ancestral environments, such as mate selection and competition, social bonding/cohesion and social grooming, perceptual and motor skill development, conflict reduction, safe time-passing, transgenerational communication, mood regulation and synchronization, and credible signaling of coalition and territorial/predator defense. Although not mutually exclusive, these different hypotheses are still not conceptually integrated nor clearly derived from independent principles. I propose The Nocturnal Evolution of Human Musicality and Performativity Theory in which the night-time is the missing piece of the adaptationist puzzle of human musicality and performing arts. The expansion of nocturnal activities throughout human evolution, which is tied to tree-to-ground sleep transition and habitual use of fire, might help (i) explain the evolution of musicality from independent principles, (ii) explain various seemingly unrelated music features and functions, and (iii) integrate many ancestral adaptive values proposed. The expansion into the nocturnal niche posed recurrent ancestral adaptive challenges/opportunities: lack of luminosity, regrouping to cook before sleep, imminent dangerousness, low temperatures, peak tiredness, and concealment of identity. These crucial night-time features might have selected evening-oriented individuals who were prone to acoustic communication, more alert and imaginative, gregarious, risk-taking and novelty-seeking, prone to anxiety modulation, hedonistic, promiscuous, and disinhibited. Those night-time selected dispositions may have converged and enhanced protomusicality into human musicality by facilitating it to assume many survival- and reproduction-enhancing roles (social cohesion and coordination, signaling of coalitions, territorial defense, antipredatorial defense, knowledge transference, safe passage of time, children lullabies, and sexual selection) that are correspondent to the co-occurring night-time adaptive challenges/opportunities. The nocturnal dynamic may help explain musical features (sound, loudness, repetitiveness, call and response, song, elaboration/virtuosity, and duetting/chorusing). Across vertebrates, acoustic communication mostly occurs in nocturnal species. The eveningness chronotype is common among musicians and composers. Adolescents, who are the most evening-oriented humans, enjoy more music. Contemporary tribal nocturnal activities around the campfire involve eating, singing/dancing, storytelling, and rituals. I discuss the nocturnal integration of musicality's many roles and conclude that musicality is probably a multifunctional mental adaptation that evolved along with the night-time adaptive landscape.
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Csajbók Z, Štěrbová Z, Brewer G, Cândea CA, De Backer CJS, Fernández AM, Fisher ML, Garcia JR, Kruger DJ, Massar K, Oberzaucher E, Quintelier KJP, van Geffen RE, Valentova JV, Varella MAC, Jonason PK. Individual Differences in How Desirable People Think They Are as a Mate. ARCHIVES OF SEXUAL BEHAVIOR 2023; 52:2475-2490. [PMID: 37154879 PMCID: PMC10501943 DOI: 10.1007/s10508-023-02601-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/13/2022] [Revised: 04/02/2023] [Accepted: 04/06/2023] [Indexed: 05/10/2023]
Abstract
Mate value is an important concept in mate choice research although its operationalization and understanding are limited. Here, we reviewed and evaluated previously established conceptual and methodological approaches measuring mate value and presented original research using individual differences in how people view themselves as a face-valid proxy for mate value in long- and short-term contexts. In data from 41 nations (N = 3895, Mage = 24.71, 63% women, 47% single), we tested sex, age, and relationship status effects on self-perceived mate desirability, along with individual differences in the Dark Triad traits, life history strategies, peer-based comparison of desirability, and self-reported mating success. Both sexes indicated more short-term than long-term mate desirability; however, men reported more long-term mate desirability than women, whereas women reported more short-term mate desirability than men. Further, individuals who were in a committed relationship felt more desirable than those who were not. Concerning the cross-sectional stability of mate desirability across the lifespan, in men, short- and long-term desirability rose to the age of 40 and 50, respectively, and decreased afterward. In women, short-term desirability rose to the age of 38 and decreased afterward, whereas long-term desirability remained stable over time. Our results suggest that measuring long- and short-term self-perceived mate desirability reveals predictable correlates.
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Affiliation(s)
- Zsófia Csajbók
- Faculty of Humanities, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic
| | | | - Gayle Brewer
- Institute of Population Health, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK
| | | | | | | | | | | | - Daniel J Kruger
- Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA
| | - Karlijn Massar
- Department of Work and Social Psychology, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands
| | | | - Katinka J P Quintelier
- School of Business and Economics, Management and Organisation, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands
| | | | | | | | - Peter K Jonason
- Department of General Psychology, University of Padua, Via Venezia, 12, 35131, Padua, PD, Italy.
- Institute of Psychology, Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University, Warsaw, Poland.
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Mailhos A, Egea-Caparrós DA, Cabana Á, Martínez-Sánchez F. Voice pitch is negatively associated with sociosexual behavior in males but not in females. Front Psychol 2023; 14:1200065. [PMID: 37496795 PMCID: PMC10367086 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1200065] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/04/2023] [Accepted: 06/12/2023] [Indexed: 07/28/2023] Open
Abstract
Acoustic cues play a major role in social interactions in many animal species. In addition to the semantic contents of human speech, voice attributes - e.g., voice pitch, formant position, formant dispersion, etc. - have been proposed to provide critical information for the assessment of potential rivals and mates. However, prior studies exploring the association of acoustic attributes with reproductive success, or some of its proxies, have produced mixed results. Here, we investigate whether the mean fundamental frequency (F0), formant position (Pf), and formant dispersion (Df) - dimorphic attributes of the human voice - are related to sociosexuality, as measured by the Revised Sociosexual Orientation Inventory (SOI-R) - a trait also known to exhibit sex differences - in a sample of native Spanish-speaking students (101 males, 147 females). Analyses showed a significant negative correlation between F0 and sociosexual behavior, and between Pf and sociosexual desire in males but not in females. These correlations remained significant after correcting for false discovery rate (FDR) and controlling for age, a potential confounding variable. Our results are consistent with a role of F0 and Pf serving as cues in the mating domain in males but not in females. Alternatively, the association of voice attributes and sociosexual orientation might stem from the parallel effect of male sex hormones both on the male brain and the anatomical structures involved in voice production.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alvaro Mailhos
- Facultad de Psicología, Universidad de la República, Montevideo, Uruguay
| | | | - Álvaro Cabana
- Facultad de Psicología, Universidad de la República, Montevideo, Uruguay
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Pah ND, Motin MA, Oliveira GC, Kumar DK. The Change of Vocal Tract Length in People with Parkinson's Disease. ANNUAL INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE OF THE IEEE ENGINEERING IN MEDICINE AND BIOLOGY SOCIETY. IEEE ENGINEERING IN MEDICINE AND BIOLOGY SOCIETY. ANNUAL INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE 2023; 2023:1-4. [PMID: 38082914 DOI: 10.1109/embc40787.2023.10340263] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/18/2023]
Abstract
Hypokinetic dysarthria is one of the early symptoms of Parkinson's disease (PD) and has been proposed for early detection and also for monitoring of the progression of the disease. PD reduces the control of vocal tract muscles such as the tongue and lips and, therefore the length of the active vocal tract is altered. However, the change in the vocal tract length due to the disease has not been investigated. The aim of this study was to determine the difference in the apparent vocal tract length (AVTL) between people with PD and age-matched control healthy people. The phoneme, /a/ from the UCI Parkinson's Disease Classification Dataset and the Italian Parkinson's Voice and Speech Dataset were used and AVTL was calculated based on the first four formants of the sustained phoneme (F1-F4). The results show a correlation between Parkinson's disease and an increase in vocal tract length. The most sensitive feature was the AVTL calculated using the first formants of sustained phonemes (F1). The other significant finding reported in this article is that the difference is significant and only appeared in the male participants. However, the size of the database is not sufficiently large to identify the possible confounding factors such as the severity and duration of the disease, medication, age, and comorbidity factors.Clinical relevance-The outcomes of this research have the potential to improve the identification of early Parkinsonian dysarthria and monitor PD progression.
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Romero D, Mebarak M, Millán A, Tovar-Castro JC, Martinez M, Rodrigues DL. Reliability and Validity of the Colombian Version of the Revised Sociosexual Orientation Inventory. ARCHIVES OF SEXUAL BEHAVIOR 2023; 52:325-331. [PMID: 36097069 PMCID: PMC9859835 DOI: 10.1007/s10508-022-02402-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/25/2021] [Revised: 08/11/2022] [Accepted: 08/12/2022] [Indexed: 06/15/2023]
Abstract
Sociosexuality refers to an individual's disposition to have casual sex without establishing affective bonds and has been widely studied worldwide using the Revised Sociosexual Orientation Inventory (SOI-R; Penke & Asendorpf, 2008). Despite its many validations in different cultural contexts, no psychometric analyses of this instrument have been conducted in Spanish-speaking Latin American countries. To address this gap in the literature, we examined the psychometric properties of the SOI-R in Colombia. In a cross-sectional study with a large sample of participants (N = 812; 64% women), we conducted exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses to identify different factor structures and determine which had the best fit for our sample and examined the reliability of the scale. Results showed that a three-factor structure, with sociosexual behaviors, attitudes, and desire as first-order factors, and global sociosexuality as a second-order factor, had the best fit indexes. Each factor presented good reliability indexes. Replicating already established gender differences, we also found that men scored higher on each factor when compared to women. These findings show that the SOI-R is a reliable and valid instrument to assess sociosexuality in countries where sociosexuality research is underrepresented.
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Affiliation(s)
- Duban Romero
- Department of Psychology, Universidad del Norte, Km.5 Vía Puerto Colombia, Barranquilla, 081007, Colombia.
| | - Moisés Mebarak
- Department of Psychology, Universidad del Norte, Km.5 Vía Puerto Colombia, Barranquilla, 081007, Colombia
| | - Anthony Millán
- Department of Psychology, Universidad del Norte, Km.5 Vía Puerto Colombia, Barranquilla, 081007, Colombia
| | | | - Martha Martinez
- Department of Psychology, Universidad Simón Bolivar, Barranquilla, Colombia
| | - David L Rodrigues
- Iscte-Instituto Universitário de Lisboa, CIS-Iscte, Lisbon, Portugal
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10
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Marin MM, Rathgeber I. Darwin’s sexual selection hypothesis revisited: Musicality increases sexual attraction in both sexes. Front Psychol 2022; 13:971988. [PMID: 36092107 PMCID: PMC9453251 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.971988] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/17/2022] [Accepted: 07/25/2022] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
A number of theories about the origins of musicality have incorporated biological and social perspectives. Darwin argued that musicality evolved by sexual selection, functioning as a courtship display in reproductive partner choice. Darwin did not regard musicality as a sexually dimorphic trait, paralleling evidence that both sexes produce and enjoy music. A novel research strand examines the effect of musicality on sexual attraction by acknowledging the importance of facial attractiveness. We previously demonstrated that music varying in emotional content increases the perceived attractiveness and dating desirability of opposite-sex faces only in females, compared to a silent control condition. Here, we built upon this approach by presenting the person depicted (target) as the performer of the music (prime), thus establishing a direct link. We hypothesized that musical priming would increase sexual attraction, with high-arousing music inducing the largest effect. Musical primes (25 s, piano solo music) varied in arousal and pleasantness, and targets were photos of other-sex faces of average attractiveness and with neutral expressions (2 s). Participants were 35 females and 23 males (heterosexual psychology students, single, and no hormonal contraception use) matched for musical background, mood, and liking for the music used in the experiment. After musical priming, females’ ratings of attractiveness and dating desirability increased significantly. In males, only dating desirability was significantly increased by musical priming. No specific effects of music-induced pleasantness and arousal were observed. Our results, together with other recent empirical evidence, corroborate the sexual selection hypothesis for the evolution of human musicality.
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Affiliation(s)
- Manuela M. Marin
- Department of Cognition, Emotion and Methods in Psychology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria
- Department of Psychology, University of Innsbruck, Innsbruck, Austria
- *Correspondence: Manuela M. Marin,
| | - Ines Rathgeber
- Department of Psychology, University of Innsbruck, Innsbruck, Austria
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11
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Varella MAC, Štěrbová Z, Bártová K, Fisher ML, Valentova JV. Evolution of Artistic and Athletic Propensities: Testing of Intersexual Selection and Intrasexual Competition. Front Psychol 2022; 13:925862. [PMID: 35874330 PMCID: PMC9301230 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.925862] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/22/2022] [Accepted: 06/13/2022] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Since Darwin proposed that human musicality evolved through sexual selection, empirical evidence has supported intersexual selection as one of the adaptive functions of artistic propensities. However, intrasexual competition has been overlooked. We tested their relative importance by investigating the relationship between the self-perceived talent/expertise in 16 artistic and 2 sports modalities and proxies of intersexual selection (i.e., mate value, mating and parenting efforts, sociosexuality, and number of sexual partners) and intrasexual competition (i.e., aggressiveness, intrasexual competitiveness) in heterosexuals. Participants were 82 Brazilian men, 166 Brazilian women, 146 Czech men, and 458 Czech women (Mage = 26.48, SD = 7.12). Factor analysis revealed five factors: Literary-arts (creative writing, humor, acting/theater/film, poetry, storytelling), Visual-arts (painting/drawing, sculpting, handcrafting, culinary arts, architecture design), Musical-arts (playing/instruments, singing, dance, whistling), Circus-arts (juggling, acrobatics), and Sports (individual, collective). Multivariate General Linear Model (GLM) showed more associations of the arts to intersexual selection in women and to intrasexual selection in men, and overall more relationships in women than in men. In women, literary and musical-arts were related to elevated inter- and intrasexual selections proxies, visual and circus-arts were related to elevated intersexual selection proxies, and sports were related to intrasexual selection proxies. In men, literary-arts and sports were related to elevated inter- and intrasexual selection proxies, musical-arts were related to intrasexual proxies, and circus-arts were related to intersexual proxies; visual-arts did not have predictors. Although present in both sexes, each sexual selection component has different relative importance in each sex. Artisticality functions to attract and maintain long/short-term partners, and to compete with mating rivals.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Zuzana Štěrbová
- Department of Psychology, Faculty of Arts, Charles University, Prague, Czechia
- Department of Zoology, Faculty of Science, Charles University, Prague, Czechia
| | - Klára Bártová
- Department of Psychology and Life Sciences, Faculty of Humanities, Charles University, Prague, Czechia
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12
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Mailhos A, Egea-Caparrós DA, Guerrero Rodríguez C, Luzardo M, Kiskimska ND, Martínez Sánchez F. Vocal Cues to Male Physical Formidability. Front Psychol 2022; 13:879102. [PMID: 35865705 PMCID: PMC9294471 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.879102] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/18/2022] [Accepted: 06/06/2022] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Animal vocalizations convey important information about the emitter, including sex, age, biological quality, and emotional state. Early on, Darwin proposed that sex differences in auditory signals and vocalizations were driven by sexual selection mechanisms. In humans, studies on the association between male voice attributes and physical formidability have thus far reported mixed results. Hence, with a view to furthering our understanding of the role of human voice in advertising physical formidability, we sought to identify acoustic attributes of male voices associated with physical formidability proxies. Mean fundamental frequency (F0), formant dispersion (Df), formant position (Pf), and vocal tract length (VTL) data from a sample of 101 male voices was analyzed for potential associations with height, weight, and maximal handgrip strength (HGS). F0 correlated negatively with HGS; Pf showed negative correlations with HGS, height and weight, whereas VTL positively correlated with HGS, height and weight. All zero-order correlations remained significant after controlling for false discovery rate (FDR) with the Benjamini–Hochberg method. After controlling for height and weight—and controlling for FDR—the correlation between F0 and HGS remained significant. In addition, to evaluate the ability of human male voices to advertise physical formidability to potential mates, 151 heterosexual female participants rated the voices of the 10 strongest and the 10 weakest males from the original sample for perceived physical strength, and given that physical strength is a desirable attribute in male partners, perceived attractiveness. Generalized linear mixed model analyses—which allow for generalization of inferences to other samples of both raters and targets—failed to support a significant association of perceived strength or attractiveness from voices alone and actual physical strength. These results add to the growing body of work on the role of human voices in conveying relevant biological information.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alvaro Mailhos
- Facultad de Psicología, Universidad de la República, Montevideo, Uruguay
- Centro de Experimentación e Innovación Social, Universidad de la República, Montevideo, Uruguay
- *Correspondence: Alvaro Mailhos,
| | | | - Cristina Guerrero Rodríguez
- Facultad de Psicología, Universidad de Cádiz, Cádiz, Spain
- Instituto Universitario de Investigación para el Desarrollo Social Sostenible, Universidad de Cádiz, Jerez de la Frontera, Spain
| | - Mario Luzardo
- Facultad de Psicología, Universidad de la República, Montevideo, Uruguay
- Centro Universitario Regional del Este, Universidad de la República, Maldonado, Uruguay
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13
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Phonemes based detection of parkinson's disease for telehealth applications. Sci Rep 2022; 12:9687. [PMID: 35690657 PMCID: PMC9188600 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-022-13865-z] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/24/2021] [Accepted: 05/30/2022] [Indexed: 12/22/2022] Open
Abstract
Dysarthria is an early symptom of Parkinson’s disease (PD) which has been proposed for detection and monitoring of the disease with potential for telehealth. However, with inherent differences between voices of different people, computerized analysis have not demonstrated high performance that is consistent for different datasets. The aim of this study was to improve the performance in detecting PD voices and test this with different datasets. This study has investigated the effectiveness of three groups of phoneme parameters, i.e. voice intensity variation, perturbation of glottal vibration, and apparent vocal tract length (VTL) for differentiating people with PD from healthy subjects using two public databases. The parameters were extracted from five sustained phonemes; /a/, /e/, /i/, /o/, and /u/, recorded from 50 PD patients and 50 healthy subjects of PC-GITA dataset. The features were statistically investigated, and then classified using Support Vector Machine (SVM). This was repeated on Viswanathan dataset with smartphone-based recordings of /a/, /o/, and /m/ of 24 PD and 22 age-matched healthy people. VTL parameters gave the highest difference between voices of people with PD and healthy subjects; classification accuracy with the five vowels of PC-GITA dataset was 84.3% while the accuracy for other features was between 54% and 69.2%. The accuracy for Viswanathan’s dataset was 96.0%. This study has demonstrated that VTL obtained from the recording of phonemes using smartphone can accurately identify people with PD. The analysis was fully computerized and automated, and this has the potential for telehealth diagnosis for PD.
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14
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Varella MAC. Evolved Features of Artistic Motivation: Analyzing a Brazilian Database Spanning Three Decades. Front Psychol 2022; 12:769915. [PMID: 34992565 PMCID: PMC8724029 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.769915] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/02/2021] [Accepted: 11/10/2021] [Indexed: 12/19/2022] Open
Abstract
Darwin explored the evolutionary processes underlying artistic propensities in humans. He stressed the universality of the human mind by pointing to the shared pleasure which all populations take in dancing, engaging in music, acting, painting, tattooing, and self-decorating. Artistic motivation drives/reinforces individuals to engage in aesthetically oriented activities. As curiosity/play, artistic behavior is hypothesized as a functionally autonomous activity motivated intrinsically through an evolved, specific, and stable aesthetic motivational system. The author tested whether artistic motivation is rather intrinsically sourced, domain-specific, and temporally stable using a large decades-long real-life public Brazilian database of university applications. In Study I, the author analyzed reasons for career-choice responded to by 403,832 late-adolescent applicants (48.84% women), between 1987 and 1998. In Study II, the author analyzed another career-choice reason question responded to by 1,703,916 late-adolescent applicants (51.02% women), between 1987 and 2020. Music, Dance, Scenic Arts, Visual Arts, and Literary Studies, in combination, presented a higher percentage of individuals reporting intrinsic factors (e.g., personal taste/aptitude/fulfillment) and the lower proportion reporting extrinsic motives (e.g., the influence of media/teacher/family, salary, social contribution/prestige) than other career groups. If artistic motivation were a recent by-product of general curiosity or status-seeking, artistic and non-artistic careers would not differ. Overall, intrinsic motives were 2.60–6.35 times higher than extrinsic factors; among artistic applicants’ were 10.81–28.38 times higher, suggesting domain-specificity. Intrinsic motivation did not differ among artistic careers and remained stable throughout the periods. Converging results corroborated a specific, stable, and intrinsically sourced artistic motivation consistent with its possible evolutionary origins.
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15
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Valentova JV, Mafra AL, Varella MAC. Enhancing the Evolutionary Science of Self-Presentation Modification. ARCHIVES OF SEXUAL BEHAVIOR 2022; 51:79-84. [PMID: 33738591 DOI: 10.1007/s10508-021-01975-0] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/02/2021] [Revised: 02/27/2021] [Accepted: 03/01/2021] [Indexed: 06/12/2023]
Affiliation(s)
- Jaroslava Varella Valentova
- Department of Experimental Psychology, Institute of Psychology, University of São Paulo, Avenida Professor Mello de Morais, 1721 - Butantã, São Paulo, SP, 05508-030, Brazil.
| | - Anthonieta Looman Mafra
- Department of Experimental Psychology, Institute of Psychology, University of São Paulo, Avenida Professor Mello de Morais, 1721 - Butantã, São Paulo, SP, 05508-030, Brazil
| | - Marco Antonio Correa Varella
- Department of Experimental Psychology, Institute of Psychology, University of São Paulo, Avenida Professor Mello de Morais, 1721 - Butantã, São Paulo, SP, 05508-030, Brazil
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16
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Hughes SM, Puts DA. Vocal modulation in human mating and competition. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 2021; 376:20200388. [PMID: 34719246 DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2020.0388] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
The human voice is dynamic, and people modulate their voices across different social interactions. This article presents a review of the literature examining natural vocal modulation in social contexts relevant to human mating and intrasexual competition. Altering acoustic parameters during speech, particularly pitch, in response to mating and competitive contexts can influence social perception and indicate certain qualities of the speaker. For instance, a lowered voice pitch is often used to exert dominance, display status and compete with rivals. Changes in voice can also serve as a salient medium for signalling a person's attraction to another, and there is evidence to support the notion that attraction and/or romantic interest can be distinguished through vocal tones alone. Individuals can purposely change their vocal behaviour in attempt to sound more attractive and to facilitate courtship success. Several findings also point to the effectiveness of vocal change as a mechanism for communicating relationship status. As future studies continue to explore vocal modulation in the arena of human mating, we will gain a better understanding of how and why vocal modulation varies across social contexts and its impact on receiver psychology. This article is part of the theme issue 'Voice modulation: from origin and mechanism to social impact (Part I)'.
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Affiliation(s)
- Susan M Hughes
- Psychology Department, Albright College, Reading, PA 19612, USA
| | - David A Puts
- Department of Anthropology, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA
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17
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Leongómez JD, Sánchez OR, Vásquez-Amézquita M, Roberts SC. Contextualising courtship: Exploring male body odour effects on vocal modulation. Behav Processes 2021; 193:104531. [PMID: 34655713 DOI: 10.1016/j.beproc.2021.104531] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/18/2020] [Revised: 06/26/2020] [Accepted: 10/07/2021] [Indexed: 12/21/2022]
Abstract
Voice characteristics are important to communicate socially relevant information. Recent research has shown that individuals alter their voices depending on the context of social interactions and perceived characteristics of the audience, and this affects how they are perceived. Numerous studies have also shown that the presence of bodily odours can elicit psychological changes in people. Here, we tested whether the presence of male axillary odour would influence vocal modulations in courtship contexts. We analysed differences in vocal parameters and attractiveness ratings across 950 recordings from 80 participants as they responded to opposite-sex target stimuli. Using these, we tested whether men's and women's vocal parameters and perceived stimuli attractiveness differed in the presence or absence of the odour. We expected women to speak with increased voice F0, and men to lower their pitch, when exposed to male body odour, especially if it were of high quality. However, neither the presence of male odour, its quality, nor the addition of androstadienone produced any consistent changes in vocal parameters. Nevertheless, rated stimulus attractiveness was predicted by F0 and especially F0 variability, suggesting that this is a key parameter in signalling attraction during human courtship, and supporting the idea that vocal modulations are context-sensitive.
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Affiliation(s)
- Juan David Leongómez
- Human Behaviour Lab, Faculty of Psychology, Universidad El Bosque, Bogota 110121, Colombia; Division of Psychology, University of Stirling, Stirling FK9 4LA, UK.
| | - Oscar R Sánchez
- Human Behaviour Lab, Faculty of Psychology, Universidad El Bosque, Bogota 110121, Colombia.
| | - Milena Vásquez-Amézquita
- Experimental Psychology Lab, Faculty of Psychology, Universidad El Bosque, Bogota 110121, Colombia.
| | - S Craig Roberts
- Division of Psychology, University of Stirling, Stirling FK9 4LA, UK.
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18
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Pisanski K, Groyecka-Bernard A, Sorokowski P. Human voice pitch measures are robust across a variety of speech recordings: methodological and theoretical implications. Biol Lett 2021; 17:20210356. [PMID: 34582736 DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2021.0356] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
Fundamental frequency (fo), perceived as voice pitch, is the most sexually dimorphic, perceptually salient and intensively studied voice parameter in human nonverbal communication. Thousands of studies have linked human fo to biological and social speaker traits and life outcomes, from reproductive to economic. Critically, researchers have used myriad speech stimuli to measure fo and infer its functional relevance, from individual vowels to longer bouts of spontaneous speech. Here, we acoustically analysed fo in nearly 1000 affectively neutral speech utterances (vowels, words, counting, greetings, read paragraphs and free spontaneous speech) produced by the same 154 men and women, aged 18-67, with two aims: first, to test the methodological validity of comparing fo measures from diverse speech stimuli, and second, to test the prediction that the vast inter-individual differences in habitual fo found between same-sex adults are preserved across speech types. Indeed, despite differences in linguistic content, duration, scripted or spontan--eous production and within-individual variability, we show that 42-81% of inter-individual differences in fo can be explained between any two speech types. Beyond methodological implications, together with recent evidence that inter-individual differences in fo are remarkably stable across the lifespan and generalize to emotional speech and nonverbal vocalizations, our results further substantiate voice pitch as a robust and reliable biomarker in human communication.
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Affiliation(s)
- Katarzyna Pisanski
- University of Wroclaw, Wroclaw, Poland.,CNRS/Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Laboratoire Dynamique du Langage, Université Lyon 2, Lyon, France.,Equipe de Neuro-Ethologie Sensorielle, Centre de Recherche en Neurosciences de Lyon, Jean Monnet University of Saint-Etienne, France
| | - Agata Groyecka-Bernard
- University of Wroclaw, Wroclaw, Poland.,Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz, Mainz, Germany
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19
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Schild C, Aung T, Kordsmeyer TL, Cardenas RA, Puts DA, Penke L. Linking human male vocal parameters to perceptions, body morphology, strength and hormonal profiles in contexts of sexual selection. Sci Rep 2020; 10:21296. [PMID: 33277544 PMCID: PMC7719159 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-77940-z] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/21/2020] [Accepted: 11/18/2020] [Indexed: 12/14/2022] Open
Abstract
Sexual selection appears to have shaped the acoustic signals of diverse species, including humans. Deep, resonant vocalizations in particular may function in attracting mates and/or intimidating same-sex competitors. Evidence for these adaptive functions in human males derives predominantly from perception studies in which vocal acoustic parameters were manipulated using specialist software. This approach affords tight experimental control but provides little ecological validity, especially when the target acoustic parameters vary naturally with other parameters. Furthermore, such experimental studies provide no information about what acoustic variables indicate about the speaker-that is, why attention to vocal cues may be favored in intrasexual and intersexual contexts. Using voice recordings with high ecological validity from 160 male speakers and biomarkers of condition, including baseline cortisol and testosterone levels, body morphology and strength, we tested a series of pre-registered hypotheses relating to both perceptions and underlying condition of the speaker. We found negative curvilinear and negative linear relationships between male fundamental frequency (fo) and female perceptions of attractiveness and male perceptions of dominance. In addition, cortisol and testosterone negatively interacted in predicting fo, and strength and measures of body size negatively predicted formant frequencies (Pf). Meta-analyses of the present results and those from two previous samples confirmed that fonegatively predicted testosterone only among men with lower cortisol levels. This research offers empirical evidence of possible evolutionary functions for attention to men's vocal characteristics in contexts of sexual selection.
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Affiliation(s)
- Christoph Schild
- Department of Psychology, University of Copenhagen, Øster Farimagsgade 2A, 1353, Copenhagen, Denmark
| | - Toe Aung
- Department of Anthropology and Center for Brain, Behavior and Cognition, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, 16802, USA
| | - Tobias L Kordsmeyer
- Department of Psychology and Leibniz ScienceCampus Primate Cognition, University of Goettingen, Gosslerstrasse 14, 37073, Göttingen, Germany
| | - Rodrigo A Cardenas
- Department of Psychology, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, 16802, USA
| | - David A Puts
- Department of Anthropology and Center for Brain, Behavior and Cognition, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, 16802, USA.
| | - Lars Penke
- Department of Psychology and Leibniz ScienceCampus Primate Cognition, University of Goettingen, Gosslerstrasse 14, 37073, Göttingen, Germany.
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20
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Pawelec ŁP, Graja K, Lipowicz A. Vocal Indicators of Size, Shape and Body Composition in Polish Men. J Voice 2020; 36:878.e9-878.e22. [PMID: 33069508 DOI: 10.1016/j.jvoice.2020.09.011] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/11/2020] [Revised: 09/13/2020] [Accepted: 09/14/2020] [Indexed: 11/25/2022]
Abstract
OBJECTIVES From a human evolution perspective, identifying a link between physique and vocal quality could demonstrate dual signaling in terms of the health and biological condition of an individual. In this regard, this study investigates the relationship between men's body size, shape, and composition, and their vocal characteristics. MATERIALS AND METHODS Eleven anthropometric measurements, using seven indices, were carried out with 80 adult Polish male participants, while the speech analysis adopted a voice recording procedure that involved phonetically recording vowels /ɑː/, /ɛː/, /iː/, /ɔː/, /uː/ to define the voice acoustic components used in Praat software. RESULTS The relationship between voice parameters and body size/shape/composition was found. The analysis indicated that the formants and their derivatives were useful parameters for prediction of height, weight, neck, shoulder, waist, and hip circumferences. Fundamental frequency (F0) was negatively correlated with neck circumference at Adam's apple level and body height. Moreover neck circumference and F0 association was observed for the first time in this paper. The association between waist circumference and formant component showed a net effect. In addition, the formant parameters showed significant correlations with body shape, indicating a lower vocal timbre in men with a larger relative waist circumference. DISCUSSION Men with lower vocal pitch had wider necks, probably a result of larynx size. Furthermore, a greater waist circumference, presumably resulting from abdominal fat distribution in men, correlated with a lower vocal timbre. While these results are inconclusive, they highlight new directions for further research.
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Affiliation(s)
- Łukasz Piotr Pawelec
- Department of Anthropology, Wroclaw University of Environmental and Life Sciences, Wroclaw, Poland.
| | - Katarzyna Graja
- Department of Anthropology, Wroclaw University of Environmental and Life Sciences, Wroclaw, Poland
| | - Anna Lipowicz
- Department of Anthropology, Wroclaw University of Environmental and Life Sciences, Wroclaw, Poland; Institute of Physiotherapy and Health Sciences, Academy of Physical Education, Katowice, Poland
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21
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Environmental threat influences preferences for sexual dimorphism in male and female faces but not voices or dances. EVOL HUM BEHAV 2020. [DOI: 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2020.05.003] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/06/2023]
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22
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Pisanski K, Raine J, Reby D. Individual differences in human voice pitch are preserved from speech to screams, roars and pain cries. ROYAL SOCIETY OPEN SCIENCE 2020; 7:191642. [PMID: 32257325 PMCID: PMC7062086 DOI: 10.1098/rsos.191642] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/18/2019] [Accepted: 01/21/2020] [Indexed: 05/19/2023]
Abstract
Fundamental frequency (F0, perceived as voice pitch) predicts sex and age, hormonal status, mating success and a range of social traits, and thus functions as an important biosocial marker in modal speech. Yet, the role of F0 in human nonverbal vocalizations remains unclear, and given considerable variability in F0 across call types, it is not known whether F0 cues to vocalizer attributes are shared across speech and nonverbal vocalizations. Here, using a corpus of vocal sounds from 51 men and women, we examined whether individual differences in F0 are retained across neutral speech, valenced speech and nonverbal vocalizations (screams, roars and pain cries). Acoustic analyses revealed substantial variability in F0 across vocal types, with mean F0 increasing as much as 10-fold in screams compared to speech in the same individual. Despite these extreme pitch differences, sexual dimorphism was preserved within call types and, critically, inter-individual differences in F0 correlated across vocal types (r = 0.36-0.80) with stronger relationships between vocal types of the same valence (e.g. 38% of the variance in roar F0 was predicted by aggressive speech F0). Our results indicate that biologically and socially relevant indexical cues in the human voice are preserved in simulated valenced speech and vocalizations, including vocalizations characterized by extreme F0 modulation, suggesting that voice pitch may function as a reliable individual and biosocial marker across disparate communication contexts.
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Affiliation(s)
- Katarzyna Pisanski
- Equipe de Neuro-Ethologie Sensorielle ENES/CRNL, University of Lyon/Saint-Etienne, CNRS UMR5292, INSERM UMR_S 1028, Saint-Etienne, France
- Author for correspondence: Katarzyna Pisanski e-mail:
| | - Jordan Raine
- Mammal Vocal Communication and Cognition Research Group, School of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK
| | - David Reby
- Equipe de Neuro-Ethologie Sensorielle ENES/CRNL, University of Lyon/Saint-Etienne, CNRS UMR5292, INSERM UMR_S 1028, Saint-Etienne, France
- Mammal Vocal Communication and Cognition Research Group, School of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK
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