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arXiv · 2307.03534

Quantifying the perceptual value of lexical and non-lexical channels in speech

Sarenne Wallbridge·Peter Bell·Catherine Lai
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Abstract

Speech is a fundamental means of communication that can be seen to provide two channels for transmitting information: the lexical channel of which words are said, and the non-lexical channel of how they are spoken. Both channels shape listener expectations of upcoming communication; however, directly quantifying their relative effect on expectations is challenging. Previous attempts require spoken variations of lexically-equivalent dialogue turns or conspicuous acoustic manipulations. This paper introduces a generalised paradigm to study the value of non-lexical information in dialogue across unconstrained lexical content. By quantifying the perceptual value of the non-lexical channel with both accuracy and entropy reduction, we show that non-lexical information produces a consistent effect on expectations of upcoming dialogue: even when it leads to poorer discriminative turn judgements than lexical content alone, it yields higher consensus among participants.

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Sarenne Wallbridge, Peter Bell, Catherine Lai. 2023-07-07. Quantifying the perceptual value of lexical and non-lexical channels in speech. https://doi.org/10.21437/interspeech.2023-1951

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