ETRW on Speaker Characterization in Speech Technology Edinburgh, Scotland, UK June 26-28, 1990

The Effect of Cognitive Stress on Pitch and Duration

A. P. A. Broeders, A. C. M. Rietveld

National Forensic Science Laboratory, Rijswijk, The Netherlands; and Department of Language and Speech, University of Nijmegen, The Netherlands

The present investigation explores the possibility of examining the effect of cognitive stress on pitch and duration. A production experiment was carried out in which short speech fragments produced in the execution of a simple task were compared with similar samples produced by speakers involved in more complex tasks. The prosodic variables investigated were the extent of the FO-excursion and the duration of the utterance. The same material was used in a perception test to determine whether listeners were able to discriminate the two types of speech material. Preliminary results show that there is no single, uniform effect for all speakers, but that effects vary for different speakers.

Full Paper

Bibliographic reference.  Broeders, A. P. A. / Rietveld, A. C. M. (1990): "The effect of cognitive stress on pitch and duration", In SCST-1990, 72-77.