Hearing smiles - Perceptual, acoustic and production aspects of labial spreading.

Abstract

This paper discusses the role of labial spreading in the perception of happiness and investigates whether untrained judges perceive labial spread samples as more smiled than neutral samples. The main experiment is a paired forced-response design perceptual experiment comparing neutral and labial spread voice quality samples. This is supplemented with articulatory measurements, which provide evidence of the differences in articulatory settings. The study's findings are discussed with reference to current theories of affect behaviour.