Supplemental Materials
The material below is intended to supplement selected publications by Peter Birkholz and coworkers. They contain, for example, autio stimuli that were used in perception experiments described in the papers.Birkholz P, Martin L, Willmes K, Kröger BJ, Neuschaefer-Rube C (submitted). The role of voice quality in the perception of vocal emotions.
In this study we examined how the sole change of voice quality can change the perception of vocal emotions in re-synthesized natural emotional utterances, when other prosodic parameters (phone duration, pitch) remain the same as in the original utterance. Below are the stimuli for one of the examined sentences ("Der Lappen liegt auf dem Eisschrank"), which was originally spoken with seven emotional expressions. For each emotion, you will first hear the original utterance re-synthesized as good as possible with regard to voice quality, phone duration, and pitch. Then you hear the same sentence with the voice quality replaced by purely breathy voice, purely modal voice, and purely pressed voice.
Birkholz P, Kröger BJ, Neuschaefer-Rube C (2011). Articulatory synthesis of words in six voice qualities using a modified two-mass model of the vocal folds. In: Proc. of the 1st International Workshop on Performative Speech and Singing Synthesis, Vancouver, BC [pdf]
In this study we examined the capability of our extended two-mass model of the vocal folds to synthesize words in different voice qualities. The following stimuli were synthesized and judged by listeners with respect to the perceived voice quality:
- Intended normal voice quality
- Intended pressed voice quality
- Intended breathy voice quality
- Intended whispery voice quality (pressed breathy/murmur)
- Intended vocal fry
- Intended falsetto
Birkholz P, Kröger BJ, Neuschaefer-Rube C (2010). Stimmsynthese mit einem Zwei-Massen-Modell der Stimmlippen mit dreieckigem Öffnungsquerschnitt. In 27th Jahrestagung der DGPP, Aachen, Germany [pdf]
- Synthetic vowel stimuli for several steps on the continuum from the minimal to the maximal glottal rest area using the classical two-mass-model of the vocal folds (wav). All stimuli were perceived as a slightly pressed to normal voice quality.
- Synthetic vowel stimuli for several steps on the continuum from the minimal to the maximal glottal rest area using the new two-mass-model of the vocal folds with a triangular glottis shape in the rest position (wav). As in reality, the voice quality changes from pressed over normal to breathy when the glottal rest area increases.
