Average speaking pitch vs. average speaker fundamental frequency - reliability, homogeneity, and self report of listener groups

Abstract

Speaker fundamental frequency often stands as equivalent to the auditory measurement of average speaking (vocal) pitch. Previously found effects regarding higher estimations of average speaking pitch vs. average F0 for female voices have been fully replicated in an identification experiment involving 13 subjects. For female voices the average value of a given group of experts measuring average speaking pitch would be 2-3 semitones higher than the acoustically measured speaker fundamental frequency. Self reports of listeners' certainty of their judgements seem not to correspond at all with any given variance in the estimations and ratings. In a complementary discrimination experiment (16 subjects) this interval seems to indicate a threshold of the same size of 2 -3 semitones for pitch discrimination in speech.