Vocal Expression Of Emotion

Abstract

Abstract This chapter reviews theoretical models and empirical evidence on the effects of emotion on vocalization, in particular on human speech. Of all expressive manifestations of emotional arousal, vocalization represents the most phylogenetically continuous modality. The neural control structures, the voice production mechanisms, and the characteristics of vocal emotion signals are comparable across many species of mammals, including humans (Hauser, 1996; Marler & Tenaza, 1977; Morton, 1977; Scherer, 1985; see chapter 24, this volume). In consequence, the study of emotional vocalization constitutes a prime tool to investigate the relationships between the physiological production of affect vocalization and its use as a signal in social interaction and communication. The basis for the following discussion is a modified version of the Brunswikian lens model (Figure 23.1; see also Kappas, Hess, & Scherer, 1991; Scherer, 1978, 1982). This model allows one to clearly distinguish between the expression (or encoding) of emotion on the sender side, the transmission of the sound, and the impression (or decoding) on the receiver side, resulting in emotion inference or attribution. Consequently, the model encourages research on the complete process of emotion communication by (1) determining which distal characteristics of the sound wave emerging from the mouth of an affectively aroused speaker (i.e., the acoustic parameters) are produced by the underlying emotion, (2) determining how these cues are transmitted from sender to receiver through the vocal-acousticauditory channel, and (3) determining how these proximal cues (the representation of the distal voice characteristics in the sensorium and the central nervous system) are used by the receiver to infer the emotion of the sender. As will be shown, most research in this area has focused either on encoding or decoding. Our aim in organizing the chapter by a model that charts the entire process is to encourage future research to attend to all of these aspects and their interrelationships.

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