Effects of Race and Sex on Acoustic Features of Voice Analysis

Abstract

This study sought to provide preliminary normative data for the vocal productions of 44 Euro-American and 40 African-American elderly speakers and to test the hypotheses that (1) Euro-American elderly speakers do not have significantly different acoustic parameters of voice from African-American elderly speakers, and (2) elderly male speakers (both Euro-American and African-American) do not have significantly different acoustic parameters of voice from elderly female speakers (both Euro-American and African-American). Voice samples from groups of 44 Euro-American (21 men and 23 women) and 40 African-American (20 men and 20 women) elderly speakers (ages 70 to 80 years) from northeastern Arkansas were compared on measures of 15 selected multidimensional voice profile (KAY Elemetrics) acoustic parameters. Analysis show that Euro-American elderly speakers did not differ significantly from African-American elderly speakers on the measurements of all the selected acoustic parameters of voice, and elderly male speakers as a group differed from elderly female speakers on the measurements of absolute jitter, soft phonation index, and standard deviation of the fundamental frequency as well as fundamental frequency in Hz. The findings suggest it may not be necessary to establish separate acoustic norms of voice for Euro-American and African-American elderly speakers. However, some acoustic parameters of voice are highly sex-dependent, and different norms may be needed for male and female speakers regardless of their racial origins.