Influence of pitch and speaker gender on perception of creaky voice

Creaky voice is a non-modal voice quality generally described as sounding pulse-like and low in pitch. While empirical studies have produced mixed results when it comes to creak prevalence by speaker gender, creaky voice is stereotypically associated with women’s speech. Past research has investigated whether listeners are facilitated in their identification of creaky voice through the degree of pitch differences between modal and creaky voice or by social biases associating creak with women’s speech. Results, however, have been relatively inconclusive. The present study addresses this question through a perception experiment, using highly controlled stimuli. 258 listeners were asked to identify whether they heard creak or not when presented with stimuli manipulated for f0 and creaky voice from two-word phrases produced by a male and a female speaker of Australian English. Accuracy data and response times were analysed. Findings suggest that speakers of Australian English rely less on social biases when identifying creaky voice and instead make decisions based on pitch, modulated by their experience-based expectations about typical pitch ranges according to speaker gender. Results emphasise the importance of incorporating characteristics of the speaker into models of the perception of creaky voice, and voice quality more generally.