Articulation rate across dialect, age, and gender

Abstract

AbstractWhether some languages or dialects are spoken faster or slower than others constitutes a gap in the understanding of sociolinguistic variation. Speech tempo is interconnected with the social, physical and psychological marking of speech. This study examines regional variation in articulation rate and its manifestations across speaker age, gender, and speaking situations (reading vs. informal talk). The results of an experimental investigation show that articulation rate differs significantly between two regional varieties of American English examined here. A group of Northern speakers (from Wisconsin) spoke significantly faster than a group of Southern speakers (from North Carolina). With regard to age and gender, young adults read faster than older adults in both regions; in informal talks, however, only Northern young adults spoke faster than older adults. Effects of gender were smaller and less consistent; men generally spoke slightly faster than women did. As the body of work on the sociophonetics of American English continues to grow in scope and depth, we argue that it is important to include fundamental phonetic information as part of our catalog of regional differences and patterns of change in American English.