The Effects of Average Fundamental Frequency and Variance of Fundamental Frequency on Male Vocal Attractiveness to Women

Keywords

Vocal attractiveness, frequency manipulation, male voices

Abstract

This paper employs a cue synthesis experimental method to examine the effects of pitch and intonation on male vocal attractiveness to women. Voices were acoustically manipulated to yield nine combinations of three levels of average fundamental frequency and three levels of variance of fundamental frequency. Strong main effects were obtained for the average fundamental frequency manipulation, with high voices rated as significantly less attractive to women than either medium or low voices, which do not differ in attractiveness. The main effects of manipulations of variance of fundamental frequency on vocal attractiveness and benevolence did not reach significance, but there was a significant interaction on the benevolence factor, with high or low average fundamental frequency manipulations being rated particularly low for voices with low variance of fundamental frequency.

Original Publication Citation

David Riding, Deryle Lonsdale, and Bruce Brown (2006). The Effects of Average Fundamental Frequency and Variance of Fundamental Frequency on Male Vocal Attractiveness to Women, Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, 30(2):55-61; Springer Netherlands.

Document Type

Peer-Reviewed Article

Publication Date

2006-07-13

Publisher

Springer Publishing

Language

English

College

Humanities

Department

Linguistics

University Standing at Time of Publication

Associate Professor

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