scholarly journals A language-familiarity effect on the recognition of computer-transformed vocal emotional cues

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tomoya Nakai ◽  
Laura Rachman ◽  
Pablo Arias ◽  
Kazuo Okanoya ◽  
Jean-Julien Aucouturier
Keyword(s):  
Native Language ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Familiarity Effect ◽  
Emotional Cues ◽  
Voice Identification ◽  
Language Familiarity ◽  
Socially Relevant ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Stimulus Degradation ◽  
Rule Out

AbstractPeople are more accurate in voice identification and emotion recognition in their native language than in other languages, a phenomenon known as the language familiarity effect (LFE). Previous work on cross-cultural inferences of emotional prosody has left it difficult to determine whether these native-language advantages arise from a true enhancement of the auditory capacity to extract socially relevant cues in familiar speech signals or, more simply, from cultural differences in how these emotions are expressed. In order to rule out such production differences, this work employed algorithmic voice transformations to create pairs of stimuli in the French and Japanese language which differed by exactly the same amount of prosodic expression. Even though the cues were strictly identical in both languages, they were better recognized when participants processed them in their native language. This advantage persisted in three types of stimulus degradation (jabberwocky, shuffled and reversed sentences). These results provide univocal evidence that production differences are not the sole drivers of LFEs in cross-cultural emotion perception, and suggest that it is the listeners’ lack of familiarity with the individual speech sounds of the other language, and not e.g. with their syntax or semantics, which impairs their processing of higher-level emotional cues.

Recognizing Speakers Across Languages

2018 ◽  
pp. 514-538
Author(s):  
Tyler K. Perrachione
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Speech Processing ◽  
Native Language ◽  
Linguistic Competence ◽  
Familiarity Effect ◽  
Neural Models ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Language Familiarity ◽  
Talker Identification ◽  
Gain Access

Listeners identify voices more accurately in their native language than an unknown, foreign language, in a phenomenon known as the language-familiarity effect in talker identification. This effect has been reliably observed for a wide range of different language pairings and using a variety of different methodologies, including voice line-ups, talker-identification training, and talker discrimination. What do listeners know about their native language that helps them recognize voices more accurately? Do listeners gain access to this knowledge when they learn a second language? Is linguistic competence necessary, or can mere exposure to a foreign language help listeners identify voices more accurately? This chapter reviews the more than three decades of research on the language-familiarity effect in talker identification, with an emphasis on how attention to this phenomenon can inform not only better psychological and neural models of memory for voices, but also better models of speech processing.

Towards a New Approach to Cross-Cultural Distinctiveness and Typicality of Human Faces: The Cross-Group Typicality/Distinctiveness Metric

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karel Kleisner ◽  
Šimon Pokorný ◽  
Selahattin Adil Saribay
Keyword(s):  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Facial Appearance ◽  
Alternative Measure ◽  
Home Culture ◽  
Facial Stimuli ◽  
The Two Cultures ◽  
Potential Applications ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Human Faces ◽  
Ingroup Outgroup

In present research, we took advantage of geometric morphometrics to propose a data-driven method for estimating the individual degree of facial typicality/distinctiveness for cross-cultural (and other cross-group) comparisons. Looking like a stranger in one’s home culture may be somewhat stressful. The same facial appearance, however, might become advantageous within an outgroup population. To address this fit between facial appearance and cultural setting, we propose a simple measure of distinctiveness/typicality based on position of an individual along the axis connecting the facial averages of two populations under comparison. The more distant a face is from its ingroup population mean towards the outgroup mean the more distinct it is (vis-à-vis the ingroup) and the more it resembles the outgroup standards. We compared this new measure with an alternative measure based on distance from outgroup mean. The new measure showed stronger association with rated facial distinctiveness than distance from outgroup mean. Subsequently, we manipulated facial stimuli to reflect different levels of ingroup-outgroup distinctiveness and tested them in one of the target cultures. Perceivers were able to successfully distinguish outgroup from ingroup faces in a two-alternative forced-choice task. There was also some evidence that this task was harder when the two faces were closer along the axis connecting the facial averages from the two cultures. Future directions and potential applications of our proposed approach are discussed.

The Relation of Language Context and Religiosity to Trilemma Judgments

2021 ◽  
pp. 002202212110339
Author(s):  
Elyas Barabadi ◽  
Mohsen Rahmani Tabar ◽  
James R. Booth
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Second Language ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Native Language ◽  
Standard Measure ◽  
Moral Norms ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Language Context

Utilitarian judgments maximize benefit for the most people, whereas deontological judgments are based on moral norms. Previous work shows that people tend to make more utilitarian judgments in their second compared to their native language, whereas higher religiosity is associated with more deontological judgments. However, it is not known whether the effect of language context is moderated by the religiosity of the individual. We hypothesized that more religious participants from all three languages would favor deontological choices irrespective of language context. In order to investigate this, we studied native speakers of Persian who either had Arabic or English as their second language, and all participants were given a standard measure of religiosity. Decision making was measured by the classic trolley trilemma in which a participant could “push” a person to save the lives of more people which is considered a utilitarian judgment. Alternatively, they could “switch” a track to save the lives of more people (“indirect”), or do nothing (“inaction”), both of which are considered deontological. Consistent with the literature showing more utilitarian judgments in the second language, English participants preferred the push option, whereas Persian participants favored the inaction option. L2 Arabic participants more often chose the indirect option. However, participants’ religiosity moderated this effect of language context. Although L2 Arabic participants’ choices were not influenced by religiosity, higher religiosity in the L2 English and L1 Persian groups was associated with more deontological choices.

scholarly journals Cinematic “Pas de Deux”: The Dialogue between Maya Deren's Experimental Filmmaking and Talley Beatty's Black Ballet Dancer in A Study in Choreography for Camera (1945)

2013 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
pp. 385-403
Author(s):  
HANNAH DURKIN
Keyword(s):  
Film History ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Experimental Film ◽  
Ballet Dancer ◽  
Emotional Experiences ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
The Us ◽  
Artistic Vision ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Ballet Dancing

A Study in Choreography for Camera (1945) is a collaborative enterprise between avant-garde filmmaker Maya Deren and African American ballet dancer Talley Beatty. Study is significant in experimental film history – it was one of three films by Deren that shaped the emergence of the postwar avant-garde cinema movement in the US. The film represents a pioneering cross-cultural and cross-disciplinary dialogue between Beatty's ballet dancing and Deren's experimental cinematic technique. The film explores complex emotional experiences through a cinematic re-creation of Deren's understanding of ritual (which she borrowed from Katherine Dunham's Haitian experiences after spending many years documenting vodou) while allowing a leading black male dancer to display his artistry on-screen. I show that cultures and artistic forms widely dismissed as incompatible are rendered equivocal. Study adopts a stylized and rhythmic technique borrowed from dance in its attempt to establish cinema as “art,” and I foreground Beatty's contribution to the film, arguing that his technically complex movements situate him as joint author of its artistic vision. The essay also explores tensions between the artistic intentions of Deren, who sought to deprivilege the individual performer in favour of the filmic “ritual,” and Beatty, who sought to display his individual skills as a technically accomplished dancer.

Gender Gaps in Electoral Turnout: Surveys versus Administrative Censuses

2021 ◽  
pp. 147892992110195
Author(s):  
Paulo Cox ◽  
Mauricio Morales Quiroga
Keyword(s):  
Survey Data ◽  
Gender Gap ◽  
Voter Turnout ◽  
Census Data ◽  
Electoral Participation ◽  
Gender Gaps ◽  
Electoral Turnout ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Official Data ◽  
Rule Out

Gender gaps in voter turnout are usually studied using opinion surveys rather than official census data. This is because administrative censuses usually do not disaggregate turnout according to voters’ sex. Without this official information, much of the research on gender gaps in electoral turnout relies on survey respondents’ self-reported behavior, either before or after an election. The decision to use survey data implies facing several potential drawbacks. Among them are the turnout overstatement bias and the attrition or nonresponse bias, both affecting the estimation of factors explaining turnout and any related statistical analysis. Furthermore, these biases may be correlated with covariates such as gender: men, more than women, may systematically overstate their electoral participation. We analyze turnout gender gaps in Chile, comparing national surveys with official administrative data, which in Chile are publicly available. Crucially, the latter includes the official record of sex, age, and the electoral behavior—whether the individual voted or not—for about 14 million registered individuals. Based on a series of statistical models, we find that analysis based on survey data is likely to rule out gender gaps in electoral participation. Carrying out the same exercises, but with official data, leads to the opposite conclusion, namely, that there is a sizable gender gap favoring women.

scholarly journals The International Tourism Development as a Way to Formation of Cross-Cultural Tolerance

2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (516) ◽  
pp. 58-64
Author(s):  
Z. A. Atamanchuk ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Values ◽  
Scientific Publication ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Communication Process ◽  
International Tourism ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Intercultural Communications ◽  
Level Of Satisfaction ◽  
The Individual

The scientific publication is aimed at exploring the communicative aspects of tourism, its value impact on humans, substantiating the peculiarities of the development of international tourism as a way to formation of cross-cultural tolerance. The article accentuates on the cultural values and value characterizations of international tourism, the role of the communicative culture of the individual as the main link in the concept of the theoretical model of universal human values, the importance of adherence to the principles of tolerance, which are becoming increasingly important in the modern world in the context of globalization of the economy, development of communications, growth of mobility, integration, interdependence and transformation of social cultures. The approaches to analyzing tourism as a social and cultural phenomenon are systematized, the stages of the communication process are distinguished. The author analyzes the content of the most significant documents in the sphere of international tourism adopted with the participation of the World Tourist Organization, which emphasizes the need to adhere to tolerant forms of communication. The focus is placed on the role of international organizations in strengthening cultural ties between peoples, mutual enrichment of cultures as a result of tourist exchange, observance of the principles of tolerance. On the way to the application in practice of establishing intercultural communications in international tourism, the article substantiates effectiveness of such methods as: introduction of an adequate system of acculturation, which involves such types of communication ties as integration, assimilation, division, marginalization at the levels of emotions, actions and cognition; creation of such conditions by the host party, which would contribute to increasing the level of satisfaction of tourists by establishing a constant exchange of information, maintaining feedback, disseminating content among visitors regarding the prospects for the development of tourist infrastructure of the host country.

scholarly journals The prevalence of extra-lethal violence across cultures in warfare

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Aaron Z. Johnson
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Analysis ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Costly Signaling ◽  
Human Relations ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Direct Benefit ◽  
Lethal Violence ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Decisive Advantage

Extra-Lethal Violence, a form of physical aggression that goes beyond the necessity to kill someone, presents a conundrum: it is inefficient and dangerous to produce, especially during warfare. Extra-Lethal Violence, particularly when it manifests in warfare, does not contribute to the immediate survival of individuals; the time, effort, and lack of awareness of surroundings or other attack suggests that Extra-Lethal Violence could be maladaptive at the individual level or in the short term. Yet this individually risky behavior that seems to have no direct benefit to the aggressor is both common and persistent across time and space. We utilized the electronic Human Relations Area Files (HRAF) to conduct a cross cultural analysis of the prevalence and potential predictors of Extra-Lethal Violence. Our research indicates that Extra-Lethal Violence is present across all populated regions of the world, for the entire timespan of the ethnographic record up to the ethnographic present, across subsistence, marriage, and social complexity levels. Our research suggests that Costly Signaling Theory (CST) is currently the best explanation for this behavior. Extra-Lethal Violence can be characterized as a difficult to fake, clear indicator of martial skill and physical fitness that has a high broadcast efficiency, both within and between groups. Rather than allowing behaviors such as Extra-Lethal Violence to be labeled as 'abhorrent' or 'disgusting,' we must view Extra-Lethal Violence in the same light as the cavalry, the ironclads, or nuclear weapons: societies seeking a decisive advantage over their enemies, utilizing available resources, be they material or behavioral.

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