Modeling perceived vocal age in american English

An acoustic analysis of voice, articulatory, and prosodic cues to perceived age was completed for a speech database of 150 American English speakers. Perceived ages were submitted to multiple linear regression analyses with measures of acoustic correlates of: voice quality, articulation, fundamental frequency, and prosody. The fit between predicted and actual perceived ages from the resulting models varied by speech material and gender, with female vocal ages being the easiest to predict. Articulation, pitch, and speaking rate measures were the most predictive in female voices, while, for male voices, the observed ranking was: speaking rate, voice quality, and pitch.