AILSA CHANG, HOST:
So in a lot of country music, you might describe the singer's voice as bright or brassy or sharp. But I bet the word you really want to use is twangy.
TZU-PEI TSAI: Twangy voice, it refers to a bright timbre that sounds like a children's taunting - nya na nya na nya na nya - or a witch's cackling (cackling).
CHANG: Tzu-Pei Tsai, who goes by Tribby, is a Ph.D. student at Indiana University. He's been studying the acoustics of twang - why it just seems to cut through the noise. And he says you don't just hear it in Nashville or on the playground.
TSAI: TV characters are like Fran, "The Nanny," Janice in "Friends" or Squidward in "SpongeBob SquarePants."
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "SPONGEBOB SQUAREPANTS")
RODGER BUMPASS: (As Squidward Tentacles) And let me just say there will come a day when I...
TSAI: The voice quality, the timbre is related to Southern music.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "9 TO 5")
DOLLY PARTON: (Singing) Working 9 to 5, what a way to make a living. Barely getting by...
TSAI: That's true, but it's also associated with many other music genres like pop rock, musical theater.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "POPULAR")
KRISTIN CHENOWETH: (As Glinda, singing) To be popular. I'll help you be popular.
JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
Before he began his Ph.D. in speech sciences, Tribby was a speech language pathologist. He'd tell people to use twang in their voice to be better understood.
TSAI: But we actually didn't have data.
SUMMERS: So Tribby and other scholars at Indiana University formulated a study. First, they got real people to talk in neutral voices, and then twangy voices. Tessa Bent is the chair of the department of speech, language and hearing sciences.
TESSA BENT: Your larynx is, like, your voice box, right? So we can raise and lower that. So if you raise your voice box or your larynx, that will change the way your voice sounds.
CHANG: The researchers then sent that speech through computer-generated voice models to standardize the volume, speech rate, pitch, intonation and accent. And they played those voices over the sounds of trains or planes for the study participants.
(SOUNDBITE OF MOVING TRAIN INTERIOR)
AI-GENERATED VOICE: (Inaudible).
CHANG: So that's a neutral female voice over the train noise. Compare that to the twangy female voice.
(SOUNDBITE OF MOVING AIRPLANE INTERIOR)
AI-GENERATED VOICE: (Inaudible).
CHANG: A little easier, maybe.
TSAI: Twangy voice was more intelligible, and twangy voice also required less listening effort.
SUMMERS: Tribby noted that the twangy voice had more intense high-frequency components than the neutral voice did, which might help explain his findings. He and his fellow researchers published their study in the journal JASA Express Letters this summer.
CHANG: They also noted that the need to be heard in loud spaces isn't just for airport workers and train conductors. It can help in emergencies and everyday life. So if you ever need to be heard, maybe make like a country singer and try some twang.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "JOLENE")
PARTON: (Singing) Jolene, Jolene, Jolene, Jolene, I'm begging of you, please don't take my man. Jolene, Jolene, Jolene, Jolene, please don't take him just because you can. Your beauty is beyond compare, with flaming locks of auburn hair. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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