Gender-specific phonetic variability: hormonal influences and occupational environment

该项目的总体目标是促进对可归因于生物和社会因素的性别差异的理解。生物学方面考虑荷尔蒙影响(A)，社会因素是职业环境(B)。该项目的结果将帮助我们了解“性别”一词在当今社会的语音和语言应用情况。该项目采取跨学科的方法，结合语音学、语言学、社会学、心理学、医学和性别研究。该项目的A部分旨在调查言语和荷尔蒙之间的关系。在生产方面，研究了某些激素(雌激素、孕激素、皮质醇、素)对特定性别的声学-语音变异性的影响。此外，潜在的交互作用因素家庭地位和交配兴趣也被考虑在内。在感知方面，我们将考察上述因素是否也影响说话人的吸引力/男性化/女性化以及听话者对特定性别语音变量的敏感性。B部分分析了语音性别典型性与职业环境之间的潜在关系。特别是，性别(非)典型职业(木匠、幼儿园教师)对性别特定的声音变异性的影响被调查。除了分析不同性别/说话者/职业在制作中的差异外，还审查了对听者的看法及其对性别和职业差异的期望和陈规定型观念的影响。将为项目的每个部分创建一个语音数据库，其中包含朗读和自发演讲的录音以及演讲者的相关元数据(性别、性别认同、年龄、职业、家庭状况、荷尔蒙水平等)。这两个部分的声学分析都包括男性和女性之间显著的语音差异(基频、共振峰、喉音、音质)。

The overall aim of the project is to promote the understanding of gender-specific linguistic variability that can be attributed to both biological and social factors. The biological aspect considers hormonal influences (A), the social factor is the occupational environment (B). Results of the project will help us to understand the phonetic and linguistic implementation of the construct "gender" in today’s society. The project takes an indisciplinary approach, combining phonetics, linguistics, sociology, psychology, medicine and gender studies.Part A of the project aims to investigate the relationship between speech and hormones. On the production side, the influence of certain hormones (estrogen, progesterone, cortisol, testosteron) on gender-specific acoustic-phonetic variability is examined. In addition, the potential interacting factors family status and mating interest are considered. On the perception side we will examine whether the factors named also affect a speaker’s perceived attractivity/masculinity/femininity and a listener’s sensitivity regarding gender-specific phonetic variability.Part B analyses the potential relationship between phonetic gender typicality and occupational environment. In particular, the influence of gender(un)typical occupations (carpenter, kindergarten teacher) on gender-specific acoustic-phonetic variability is investigated. Besides an analysis of gender-/speaker-/occupation-specific variation in production, the impact on listeners’ perceptions and their expectations and stereotypes regarding gender- and occupation-specific variability is examined.A speech data base for each part of the project will be created containing acoustic recordings of read and spontaneous speech together with relevant metadata of the speakers (gender, gender identity, age, occupation, family status, hormon levels, etc.). Acoustic analyses for both parts comprise the salient phonetic differences between males and females (fundamental frequency, formants, sibilants, voice quality).