F0 range and peak alignment across speakers and emotions

We present an analysis of F₀ range and peak alignment in emotional speech from a heterogeneous group of speakers varying in age and gender. Both speaker and emotion had a strong effect on F₀ range. Despite these large changes in the F₀ trajectory, peak alignment was remarkably stable. Using the Linear Alignment Model (LAM), we show that the effects on alignment of emotion and speaker differences, al though statistically significant, are small. This stability results in a conclusion that peak alignment, unlike F₀ range, does not appear to carry much information about speaker identity or emotional state. The LAM is effective in that it explains 42% of the variance in peak location on average, and furthermore it predicts the time of F₀ peaks with an average RMS error of 12ms.