ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences2021
Harsh is large: nonlinear vocal phenomena lower voice pitch and exaggerate body size.
Article in Proceedings. Biological sciences, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 26 papers.
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26 citing papers in PubMed, 51 citations in OpenAlex.
- Low-cost, open-source, full-stack software and Arduino-based hardware for control of commercially available animal behavior systems.Behavior research methods · 2026Article
- Distress vocalizations ofCurrent zoology · 2026Article
- Acoustic parameter combinations underlying mapping of pseudoword sounds to multiple domains of meaning: Representational similarity analyses and machine-learning models.The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America · 2025Article
- Behind a Voice There is a Speaker: Why Vocal Emotion Research Needs to Become 'Personal'.Affective science · 2025Review
- Acoustic estimation of voice roughness.Attention, perception & psychophysics · 2025Article
- Article
- Nonlinear phenomena in pinnipeds: a preliminary investigation in the contact calls of northern elephant seal pups.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Article
- Nonlinear acoustic phenomena affect the perception of pain in human baby cries.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Article
- Nonlinear vocal phenomena and speech intelligibility.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Article
- Exploring nonlinear phenomena in animal vocalizations through oscillator theory.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Review
- Nonlinear phenomena in vertebrate vocalizations: mechanisms and communicative functions.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Article
- Singing out of tune: sexual and developmental differences in the occurrence of nonlinear phenomena in primate songs.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Article
- How to analyse and manipulate nonlinear phenomena in voice recordings.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Review
- Emotions mediate nonlinear phenomena production in the vocalizations of two ape species.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Article
- Acoustic context and dynamics of nonlinear phenomena in mammalian calls: the case of puppy whines.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Article
- The Scope and Limits of Iconic Prosody: Head Angle PredictsOpen mind : discoveries in cognitive science · 2025Article
- Pain cues override identity cues in baby cries.iScience · 2024Article
- Humans need auditory experience to produce typical volitional nonverbal vocalizations.Communications psychology · 2024Article
- Singing more, singing harsher: occurrence of nonlinear phenomena in a primate' song.Animal cognition · 2023Article
- Crocodile perception of distress in hominid baby cries.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
A lion's roar, a dog's bark, an angry yell in a pub brawl: what do these vocalizations have in common? They all sound harsh due to nonlinear vocal phenomena (NLP)-deviations from regular voice production, hypothesized to lower perceived voice pitch and thereby exaggerate the apparent body size of the vocalizer. To test this yet uncorroborated hypothesis, we synthesized human nonverbal vocalizations, such as roars, groans and screams, with and without NLP (amplitude modulation, subharmonics and chaos). We then measured their effects on nearly 700 listeners' perceptions of three psychoacoustic (pitch, timbre, roughness) and three ecological (body size, formidability, aggression) characteristics. In an explicit rating task, all NLP lowered perceived voice pitch, increased voice darkness and roughness, and caused vocalizers to sound larger, more formidable and more aggressive. Key results were replicated in an implicit associations test, suggesting that the 'harsh is large' bias will arise in ecologically relevant confrontational contexts that involve a rapid, and largely implicit, evaluation of the opponent's size. In sum, nonlinearities in human vocalizations can flexibly communicate both formidability and intention to attack, suggesting they are not a mere byproduct of loud vocalizing, but rather an informative acoustic signal well suited for intimidating potential opponents.
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