Legitimacy, status, and the acoustic signature of deferential speech

Abstract

An individual's marshaling of status cues in task situations represents one aspect of self-presentation and serves as a basis from which individuals express, and others interpret, claims to be able to contribute to the group’s success (Berger et al. 1977, 1986). I integrate existing theories of competence-based and dominance-based legitimation into the framework and function of strong and weak status cue gestalts (Fişek, Berger, and Norman 2005), as well as offer and validate a new unobtrusive non-verbal vocal measure of internalized status and collective validation. In particular, the present project features a design examining manipulated authority, manipulated legitimacy (authorization), and vocal adaptation in same- and mixed-sex task groups. A focus on vocal adaptation at the fundamental frequency (F0) of speech, also called the first harmonic frequency as it refers to the highest common factor of a periodic waveform, builds on recent work by Gregory and Gallagher (2002) that identifies the bandwidth of F0 between 0.0 kHz and 0.5 kHz as important to processes involving social status and influence. I predict that individuals will adapt their F0 patterns towards those of higher status group members.