Fouquet Meddy, Pisanski Katarzyna, Mathevon Nicolas, Reby David
Mammal Vocal Communication and Cognition Research Group, School of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK; Equipe Neuro-Ethologie Sensorielle, ENES/Neuro-PSI CNRS UMR 9197, University of Lyon/Saint-Etienne, Saint-Etienne, France.
Mammal Vocal Communication and Cognition Research Group, School of Psychology , University of Sussex , Brighton , UK.
R Soc Open Sci. 2016 Oct 5;3(10):160395. doi: 10.1098/rsos.160395. eCollection 2016 Oct.
Voice pitch (the perceptual correlate of fundamental frequency, 0) varies considerably even among individuals of the same sex and age, communicating a host of socially and evolutionarily relevant information. However, due to the almost exclusive utilization of cross-sectional designs in previous studies, it remains unknown whether these individual differences in voice pitch emerge before, during or after sexual maturation, and whether voice pitch remains stable into adulthood. Here, we measured the 0 parameters of men who were recorded once every 7 years from age 7 to 56 as they participated in the British television documentary . Linear mixed models revealed significant effects of age on all 0 parameters, wherein 0 mean, minimum, maximum and the standard deviation of 0 showed sharp pubertal decreases between age 7 and 21, yet remained remarkably stable after age 28. Critically, men's pre-pubertal 0 at age 7 strongly predicted their 0 at every subsequent adult age, explaining up to 64% of the variance in post-pubertal 0. This finding suggests that between-individual differences in voice pitch that are known to play an important role in men's reproductive success are in fact largely determined by age 7, and may therefore be linked to prenatal and/or pre-pubertal androgen exposure.
即使在年龄和性别相同的个体中，音高（基频的感知对应物，即F0）也存在相当大的差异，它传达了许多与社会和进化相关的信息。然而，由于以往研究几乎只采用横断面设计，目前尚不清楚这些音高的个体差异是在性成熟之前、期间还是之后出现的，以及音高在成年后是否保持稳定。在这里，我们测量了从7岁到56岁每7年记录一次的男性的F0参数，这些男性参与了英国电视纪录片的拍摄。线性混合模型显示年龄对所有F0参数都有显著影响，其中F0均值、最小值、最大值和F0标准差在7岁到21岁之间呈现青春期急剧下降，但在28岁之后保持相当稳定。至关重要的是，男性7岁时青春期前的F0强烈预测了他们在随后每个成年年龄的F0，解释了青春期后F0高达64%的方差。这一发现表明，已知在男性生殖成功中起重要作用的音高个体差异实际上在很大程度上由7岁时决定，因此可能与产前和/或青春期前的雄激素暴露有关。
