High pitched, extended vowels and incredibly articulated: so-called ‘gay voice’ is a real phenomenon, researchers say.
Two science YouTubers have scoured studies behind the theory that homosexual men have a unique twang that transcends aspects like culture and upbringing.
Mitch Moffit, a biologist, and Greg Brown, a science teacher — who are both gay — explored what exactly constitutes a ‘gay voice’ and what might cause it.
In a clip uploaded to their channel, AsapSCIENCE, earlier this year the pair looked at research dating back to the early 90s.
They found that analysis comparing the pitch of straight and homosexual men’s voices found key differences in how they speak.
High pitched, extended vowels and incredibly articulated, so-called ‘gay voice’ is a real phenomenon, researchers say. Stock image
Mr Moffit explained: ‘Results find that gay men speak with higher pitch variation meaning that their range from low to high is much more extreme than straight men.’
Mr Brown added: ‘Gay men were also found to have longer vowel durations for “a”, “i”, and “u” — they hold these vowels longer in general when they speak compared to straight men.’
One interesting aspect of these pitch analyses was that the results weren’t language specific and were replicated across English, French and Dutch.
‘The gay voice expands beyond language and isn’t just the words or culture we engage in,’ Mr Moffit said.
Mr Brown also highlighted a specific way the ‘s’ sound seemed to be spoken amongst gay men.
‘Gay men are also more likely to hold their s sound for longer than straight people,’ he said.
He highlighted how this is contrary to the so-called ‘gay lisp’, a perceived quality of gay men’s speech where they misarticulate the ‘s’ sound as ‘th’.
Mitch Moffit, a biologist, and Greg Brown, a science teacher — who are both gay — explored what exactly constitutes a ‘gay voice’ and what might cause it
Studies, however, have shown homosexual men don’t have an increased rate of lisps than their straight counterparts.
But one key observed difference between the sexualities was that straight men are more likely to mumble and slur their words compared to gay men who were more articulate.
These initial findings sparked theories that ‘gay voice’ was linked to hormones, specifically the male sex hormone testosterone.
Testosterone performs a variety of functions in the body, and specifically for the voice, deepens it during male puberty.
So, the theory went that gay men weren’t, for whatever reason, getting as much testosterone as straight men, leading to a different sounding voice.
However, studies to explore the theory found no evidence of this with gay men producing just as much testosterone as heterosexual ones.
With an internal cause a dead-end scientists started to look at external environmental factors and found something quite interesting.
One interesting aspect of these pitch analyses was that the results weren’t language specific and were replicated across English, French and Dutch
It turns out both gay and straight men change how they sound based on who was listening.
Mr Brown explained: ‘One study found straight men would speak more stereotypically masculine to strangers than to people they were comfortable with.’
He continued: ‘Straight men would lower their voice when speaking in leadership roles when giving orders or commands.
‘They would also lower their voice in the presence of an attractive woman.’
Mr Moffit said gay men would also change their voice but in different contexts.
‘A Thai study found that gay people changed their voice depending on if they’re talking to friends, co-workers or their family members,’ he said.
‘They tend to use the most falsetto voice speech, or upper vocal range, when talking to friends
‘An Italian study also found that gay men would sound more gay when they were talking to somebody they already came out to or if they were speaking to somebody who they presumed was gay.’
He added some studies had also found gay men who expressed a dislike for ‘sounding gay’ deliberately changed their speech.
More recent research has discovered both gay and straight men change how they sound based on who was listening, and what they wanted to project to these groups
When volunteers were given samples of these men’s voices to listen to, these gay men were more likely to be identified as straight, showing in principle ‘gay voice’ was able to be modified.
Mr Moffit said one of his favourite studies on the subject was one on gay YouTubers which found after they came out, listeners would find them sounding increasingly gay over time.
These findings, taken as whole, gave rise to the hypothesis that gay voice, rather than an innate way of speaking, is a form of social signalling.
As Mr Brown explains: ‘This has led to a theory that sounding gay is an adaptation of gay men to allow others around them to know that they are in fact gay.’
As such its context dependent and can be muted or changed entirely if a person doesn’t want to send out that signal.
While the pair said some research had been done on lesbian voices, such studies were far fewer than those in gay men and while experts had found some differences these weren’t as distinct as those among homosexual men.
Mr Brown concluded the clip by saying it was critical to remember that observed differences in straight and homosexual voices were overall trends and would naturally vary by individual.
‘Of course many straight men can sound gay and gay men can sound straight,’ he said.
‘But studies show there is a difference in speech that will change based on who was listening to you.’
The pair also recently discussed the phenomenon of ‘gay face’ and if people, and AI, could tell if a person is gay or lesbian based on the physical characteristics of their face.
