Idiosyncratic and shared contributions shape impressions from voices and faces

Abstract

Voices elicit rich first impressions of what the person we are hearing might be like. Research stresses that these impressions from voices are shared across different listeners, such that people on average agree which voices sound trustworthy or old and which do not. However, can impressions from voices also be shaped by the ‘ear of the beholder’? We investigated whether - and how - listeners' idiosyncratic, personal preferences contribute to first impressions from voices. In two studies (993 participants, 156 voices), we find evidence for substantial idiosyncratic contributions to voice impressions using a variance portioning approach. Overall, idiosyncratic contributions were as important as shared contributions to impressions from voices for inferred person characteristics (e.g., trustworthiness, friendliness). Shared contributions were only more influential for impressions of more directly apparent person characteristics (e.g., gender, age). Both idiosyncratic and shared contributions were reduced when stimuli were limited in their (perceived) variability, suggesting that natural variation in voices is key to understanding this impression formation. When comparing voice impressions to face impressions, we found that idiosyncratic and shared contributions to impressions similarly across modality when stimulus properties are closely matched - although voice impressions were overall less consistent than face impressions. We thus reconceptualise impressions from voices as being formed not only based on shared but also idiosyncratic contributions. We use this new framing to suggest future directions of research, including understanding idiosyncratic mechanisms, development, and malleability of voice impression formation.