The emotional quality of speech in voice services

The emotional quality of speech is defined as the global qualitative and hedonic impressions experienced by listeners. This research investigated the emotional quality of speech samples used in voice services. In a first experiment listening tests were conducted using 200 messages generated by 20 female speakers who pronounced two sentences in five elocution styles. Listeners grouped the messages according to similarities in terms of the impression of the messages. Verbal comments regarding hedonic effect on the listener and acoustic parameters of the voices' timbre and intonation were analysed. In a second experiment, the 200 messages were evaluated according to 20 criteria extracted from the first experiment. The results produced a precise perceptive portrait for each sequence, giving a full picture of the listeners' impressions of what they heard. The results can be applied to the design of voice services, as was done for the voicemail of France Telecom Orange.