1
00:00:03,120 --> 00:00:06,000
Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff

2
00:00:06,000 --> 00:00:14,040
Speaker 1: Works dot com. Hey, wasn't the stuff to blow your mind?

3
00:00:14,080 --> 00:00:16,960
Speaker 1: My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Julie. Can't get

4
00:00:17,000 --> 00:00:20,480
Speaker 1: a nun? You love Douglas? Yeah? Are you? Are you

5
00:00:20,520 --> 00:00:25,920
Speaker 1: a frog? I'm Berry White. Oh okay, I was getting

6
00:00:25,960 --> 00:00:29,520
Speaker 1: a little more cartoon frog than Verry White. But man,

7
00:00:29,640 --> 00:00:32,800
Speaker 1: this place, I'm telling you how stuff works. You try

8
00:00:32,840 --> 00:00:35,080
Speaker 1: to bust out an accent here or any sort of

9
00:00:35,479 --> 00:00:39,080
Speaker 1: vocal nuance, and you have a bunch of experts chining in.

10
00:00:40,240 --> 00:00:41,680
Speaker 1: But no, it's good to you went for Verry White,

11
00:00:41,720 --> 00:00:45,239
Speaker 1: because today we're talking about the very wide effect. We're

12
00:00:45,240 --> 00:00:47,159
Speaker 1: talking a little bit about Barry White, a little bit

13
00:00:47,200 --> 00:00:50,800
Speaker 1: about Marilyn Monroe, throwing in some koalas here and there.

14
00:00:50,840 --> 00:00:53,760
Speaker 1: But but first, let let's just talk very briefly about

15
00:00:53,880 --> 00:00:57,200
Speaker 1: Marilyn Monroe and Barry White from sort of a cultural standpoint,

16
00:00:57,240 --> 00:01:01,640
Speaker 1: like both of these are icons of sex appeal that

17
00:01:03,000 --> 00:01:05,559
Speaker 1: really may not hold up as we were discussing earlier,

18
00:01:05,600 --> 00:01:09,240
Speaker 1: to uh to, to modern pop culture standards, and certainly

19
00:01:09,280 --> 00:01:11,679
Speaker 1: to any individual out there, you might not think, oh, well,

20
00:01:11,720 --> 00:01:14,480
Speaker 1: you know, Verry Wide is the the be all of

21
00:01:14,640 --> 00:01:17,520
Speaker 1: male sexuality or you might you might not have Marilyn

22
00:01:17,560 --> 00:01:21,000
Speaker 1: Monroe posters all over your dorm room. Um, but they

23
00:01:21,280 --> 00:01:25,000
Speaker 1: still have this sort of iconic um power to them. Yeah,

24
00:01:25,040 --> 00:01:29,399
Speaker 1: they do. They are just brimming with sexuality. And some

25
00:01:29,520 --> 00:01:32,600
Speaker 1: of that is because of the type of music that

26
00:01:32,800 --> 00:01:35,480
Speaker 1: very White created. It was very much like I'm gonna

27
00:01:35,480 --> 00:01:38,560
Speaker 1: put the player on and we're gonna get down right now.

28
00:01:38,640 --> 00:01:42,440
Speaker 1: He wasn't doing historical ballads about you know, about the

29
00:01:42,600 --> 00:01:45,480
Speaker 1: battles in in history or anything. He was very much

30
00:01:45,560 --> 00:01:49,320
Speaker 1: get down to business. And in terms of Marylyn Row,

31
00:01:49,400 --> 00:01:53,320
Speaker 1: I mean she is sort of like a female through

32
00:01:53,360 --> 00:01:59,400
Speaker 1: the cultural lens completely, you know, um, characaturist, sort of

33
00:01:59,440 --> 00:02:02,080
Speaker 1: the Betty boot living Betty boop. Yeah, and she does

34
00:02:02,120 --> 00:02:04,680
Speaker 1: for the roles she played. I don't recall ever having

35
00:02:04,680 --> 00:02:08,160
Speaker 1: seen Marilyn Monroe movie where she threw a karate chop

36
00:02:08,320 --> 00:02:10,359
Speaker 1: or um, you know, or fought an alien on a

37
00:02:10,400 --> 00:02:12,679
Speaker 1: space ship. It was it was very much Marilyn on

38
00:02:12,800 --> 00:02:16,080
Speaker 1: her as Marilyn Monroe. Um, you know, copy and paste,

39
00:02:16,080 --> 00:02:18,680
Speaker 1: repeat right. That was her purview, right. She wasn't trying

40
00:02:18,720 --> 00:02:22,600
Speaker 1: to put forward this idea of a balanced idea of

41
00:02:22,720 --> 00:02:26,440
Speaker 1: what a woman could be or should be. So here

42
00:02:26,480 --> 00:02:29,440
Speaker 1: we have these big iconic presences and we have a

43
00:02:29,480 --> 00:02:32,400
Speaker 1: couple of studies to actually relate to them. And at

44
00:02:32,400 --> 00:02:35,600
Speaker 1: the bottom of all this, there's this idea that we

45
00:02:35,680 --> 00:02:38,880
Speaker 1: might actually have a voice prejudice. We might hear certain

46
00:02:39,280 --> 00:02:42,639
Speaker 1: voices and gravitate toward them. And we're going to explore

47
00:02:42,680 --> 00:02:45,000
Speaker 1: this idea. Yeah, and and and that end of itself

48
00:02:45,080 --> 00:02:46,840
Speaker 1: when we can all relate to that there are certain

49
00:02:46,919 --> 00:02:49,200
Speaker 1: voices that are going to annoy us in our lives,

50
00:02:49,200 --> 00:02:52,919
Speaker 1: and we're gonna have certain uh taste that revolve around

51
00:02:52,919 --> 00:02:54,720
Speaker 1: other voices. Like it's like some people are gonna be

52
00:02:54,800 --> 00:02:58,240
Speaker 1: really annoyed by a high nasal voice or or even

53
00:02:58,360 --> 00:03:00,359
Speaker 1: a really deep voice. I could say that as being annoying.

54
00:03:00,360 --> 00:03:03,280
Speaker 1: I mean, there's so many like everything that we've discussed

55
00:03:03,560 --> 00:03:08,919
Speaker 1: concerning where the human condition meets uh Darwinian evolution. There's

56
00:03:08,960 --> 00:03:11,200
Speaker 1: there's what we have evolved to be, and then there's

57
00:03:11,240 --> 00:03:15,000
Speaker 1: the complications that have arisen from the ascension of human

58
00:03:15,040 --> 00:03:18,639
Speaker 1: consciousness and the layers of culture we put over everything well,

59
00:03:18,639 --> 00:03:20,000
Speaker 1: and one of the ways that we try to cut

60
00:03:20,040 --> 00:03:21,799
Speaker 1: through all of that and try to figure out whether

61
00:03:21,880 --> 00:03:25,160
Speaker 1: or not there's some sort of baseline two voices, and

62
00:03:25,200 --> 00:03:27,399
Speaker 1: the way that we react to them is we look

63
00:03:27,520 --> 00:03:33,000
Speaker 1: to the animal world, specifically residents, frequencies, and animals. So

64
00:03:33,040 --> 00:03:35,360
Speaker 1: we've seen studies of animals and birds that reveal that

65
00:03:35,400 --> 00:03:38,400
Speaker 1: listeners can figure out body size and what the intent

66
00:03:39,000 --> 00:03:43,360
Speaker 1: of the collar is based our frequency, voice quality, and

67
00:03:43,480 --> 00:03:48,280
Speaker 1: format spacing. So this format spacing is really important because

68
00:03:48,320 --> 00:03:50,040
Speaker 1: as we're going to go on and talk about these

69
00:03:50,120 --> 00:03:54,720
Speaker 1: lower pitches, those are really are at the heart of

70
00:03:54,760 --> 00:03:58,560
Speaker 1: what makes something very low pitched. So essentially, lower pitched

71
00:03:58,680 --> 00:04:04,280
Speaker 1: vocalizations are less space between something called formats okay, and

72
00:04:04,320 --> 00:04:11,000
Speaker 1: these formats uh, These frequencies are emphasized frequencies within vocalizations

73
00:04:11,040 --> 00:04:14,560
Speaker 1: and humans, formats are essential to speech and they help

74
00:04:14,640 --> 00:04:18,279
Speaker 1: us to distinguish between vowels. So, in effect, an animals

75
00:04:18,360 --> 00:04:22,400
Speaker 1: roar or vocal communication of its choice is going to

76
00:04:22,440 --> 00:04:26,080
Speaker 1: be a key to its size. The lower, more baritone

77
00:04:26,160 --> 00:04:30,679
Speaker 1: sounds are going to say hey, I'm a big animal,

78
00:04:30,720 --> 00:04:32,760
Speaker 1: as opposed to the higher ones that would say hey,

79
00:04:32,800 --> 00:04:35,239
Speaker 1: I'm a smaller animal. Yeah. I mean, there's this idea

80
00:04:35,320 --> 00:04:39,560
Speaker 1: that pure tone like sounds are more likely to suggest

81
00:04:39,680 --> 00:04:47,080
Speaker 1: a smaller size, submissiveness and fear that sounds yeah like that. Yeah, yeah.

82
00:04:47,120 --> 00:04:50,599
Speaker 1: Now one particular study, because because you want specific examples

83
00:04:50,640 --> 00:04:52,720
Speaker 1: of this, I'm sure we would looked at a two

84
00:04:52,720 --> 00:04:55,799
Speaker 1: thousand and eleven study publishing the Journal of Experimental Biology,

85
00:04:55,839 --> 00:04:58,920
Speaker 1: and they looked at koala bears. Now, koala bears, if

86
00:04:59,080 --> 00:05:00,720
Speaker 1: you don't know anything about up them, you might think

87
00:05:00,720 --> 00:05:03,119
Speaker 1: of them as purely a sexual creatures that live only

88
00:05:03,640 --> 00:05:06,200
Speaker 1: on you know, tree limbs or in baby cribs. You know,

89
00:05:06,279 --> 00:05:09,080
Speaker 1: they're Steph quala airs. I mean, they're very adorable looking,

90
00:05:09,120 --> 00:05:11,400
Speaker 1: but of course, like any animal, they engaged and rather

91
00:05:11,680 --> 00:05:15,839
Speaker 1: raucous sexual life all their own. UM. We've we've discussed

92
00:05:15,839 --> 00:05:19,280
Speaker 1: in the past lesbian qualas that will push one another

93
00:05:19,360 --> 00:05:22,920
Speaker 1: up against plants and and have their way, and so

94
00:05:23,400 --> 00:05:25,800
Speaker 1: you know, the kualas are a decent place to look

95
00:05:26,200 --> 00:05:29,800
Speaker 1: for examples of of this kind of vocal frequency. UM

96
00:05:30,600 --> 00:05:33,640
Speaker 1: is used as a kind of mating signature. And indeed

97
00:05:33,680 --> 00:05:36,040
Speaker 1: they found it by um that the that the male

98
00:05:36,120 --> 00:05:38,920
Speaker 1: qualas advertise their size by changing the residents of their

99
00:05:38,960 --> 00:05:44,719
Speaker 1: calls lower resonance. Again called formats have a more baritone quality,

100
00:05:44,839 --> 00:05:47,240
Speaker 1: and that just just telling the lady quala is out

101
00:05:47,240 --> 00:05:50,200
Speaker 1: there Hey, I'm big. I'm a big kuala and the

102
00:05:50,200 --> 00:05:52,680
Speaker 1: the underlying theme here is that I'm a big koala

103
00:05:52,839 --> 00:05:56,000
Speaker 1: that can fight off other koalas. So if you, if

104
00:05:56,000 --> 00:05:58,599
Speaker 1: you hear me, guys, know that I am a rather

105
00:05:59,080 --> 00:06:01,520
Speaker 1: sizeable opponent, you know, on a mess with me, and ladies,

106
00:06:01,960 --> 00:06:04,520
Speaker 1: I am a preferred nate because as a large koala,

107
00:06:04,600 --> 00:06:07,760
Speaker 1: I'm more likely to give you large koala offspring who

108
00:06:07,800 --> 00:06:11,640
Speaker 1: will in turn have mating success in their lives. So

109
00:06:11,720 --> 00:06:15,440
Speaker 1: there's a very you know, hardcore Darwinian message here. Uh,

110
00:06:15,720 --> 00:06:17,280
Speaker 1: I mean, it all comes down to the passing of

111
00:06:17,400 --> 00:06:20,400
Speaker 1: jeans one generation to the next and trying to gain

112
00:06:20,480 --> 00:06:23,960
Speaker 1: the next generation for success. Yeah, and uh this actually

113
00:06:23,960 --> 00:06:27,400
Speaker 1: points to the research of a group of twenty male

114
00:06:27,520 --> 00:06:31,640
Speaker 1: kualas during the kuala breeding season at Lone Pine Koala

115
00:06:32,200 --> 00:06:36,680
Speaker 1: Sanctuary in Australia. And usually these guys, these little cute marsupials,

116
00:06:36,720 --> 00:06:38,800
Speaker 1: are pretty quiet this the year, but when it is

117
00:06:38,880 --> 00:06:42,520
Speaker 1: mating season they do have that deep, choppy growl. And so,

118
00:06:42,560 --> 00:06:45,800
Speaker 1: as you say, the promise here and the research that

119
00:06:45,880 --> 00:06:48,560
Speaker 1: was born out here is again there's a larger body

120
00:06:48,600 --> 00:06:53,159
Speaker 1: size headsize that's correlated with the lower frequencies and this

121
00:06:53,360 --> 00:06:56,720
Speaker 1: idea of hey, I'm going to create more competitive offspring

122
00:06:56,839 --> 00:06:59,560
Speaker 1: for you. And in the case of something like a

123
00:06:59,600 --> 00:07:03,279
Speaker 1: foul dear, a low frequency growl that's heard off in

124
00:07:03,320 --> 00:07:07,880
Speaker 1: the distance might discourage another would be suitors to a

125
00:07:08,000 --> 00:07:11,560
Speaker 1: fellow dough, let's say, to retreat from the area. So

126
00:07:11,680 --> 00:07:14,560
Speaker 1: it's not just like hey, I'm gonna give you some

127
00:07:14,720 --> 00:07:19,480
Speaker 1: really sturdy young n's, but it could also be something

128
00:07:19,600 --> 00:07:22,440
Speaker 1: of a play that's kind of like, hey, you better

129
00:07:22,440 --> 00:07:25,240
Speaker 1: step off because I'm in the area. All right. So this,

130
00:07:25,280 --> 00:07:28,160
Speaker 1: i'll leads to the inevitable question what about humans? Is it?

131
00:07:28,240 --> 00:07:30,800
Speaker 1: Is it the same with us? What about Barry White?

132
00:07:30,840 --> 00:07:33,520
Speaker 1: And indeed had his very white factor because Barry White,

133
00:07:33,840 --> 00:07:36,760
Speaker 1: just to to to remind everyone, was a very big man.

134
00:07:36,880 --> 00:07:39,400
Speaker 1: I mean he he struggled with obesity, you know, most

135
00:07:39,440 --> 00:07:42,000
Speaker 1: of his adult life, but he's also six four. He

136
00:07:42,080 --> 00:07:45,960
Speaker 1: was a big dude, an imposing figure, but also one

137
00:07:46,040 --> 00:07:49,720
Speaker 1: that that again became iconic because he had this uh

138
00:07:49,800 --> 00:07:54,040
Speaker 1: this kind of soft, uh teddy bear kind of quality

139
00:07:54,040 --> 00:07:55,720
Speaker 1: to him as well, like you never doubted that he

140
00:07:55,760 --> 00:07:58,240
Speaker 1: could he could stand up for himself and he could

141
00:07:58,440 --> 00:08:01,520
Speaker 1: put a new place. But he was a approachable he was.

142
00:08:01,280 --> 00:08:05,640
Speaker 1: He had this lovable charm and charisma about him. Well,

143
00:08:05,680 --> 00:08:09,240
Speaker 1: there is a study that was published in Plos one

144
00:08:09,360 --> 00:08:13,120
Speaker 1: called human vocal attractiveness as Signaled by body size projection,

145
00:08:13,520 --> 00:08:16,400
Speaker 1: and this looks at both high frequency and low frequency

146
00:08:16,440 --> 00:08:18,920
Speaker 1: and it found, let's look at the males first, that

147
00:08:19,040 --> 00:08:23,480
Speaker 1: male listeners preferred female voices with high pitch, breathy voice

148
00:08:23,600 --> 00:08:27,239
Speaker 1: in wide format spacing because it correlated with a smaller

149
00:08:27,240 --> 00:08:32,760
Speaker 1: body size. Does this sound like anyone you've ever known? President?

150
00:08:35,000 --> 00:08:37,600
Speaker 1: I think that was that was pretty spot on. It's

151
00:08:37,679 --> 00:08:41,640
Speaker 1: kind of hard to do. Um. Now, a breathy voice

152
00:08:41,679 --> 00:08:44,520
Speaker 1: is indicative of the higher pitches that you would see

153
00:08:44,559 --> 00:08:47,920
Speaker 1: in younger, thinner vocal cords. So there's this idea that

154
00:08:48,040 --> 00:08:53,040
Speaker 1: it is suggesting that it's a youthful person. Um. And

155
00:08:53,080 --> 00:08:56,160
Speaker 1: then it is achieved by increasing the amount of air

156
00:08:56,240 --> 00:09:00,040
Speaker 1: passing through vocal chords, giving it an aspirated quality. For

157
00:09:00,120 --> 00:09:03,200
Speaker 1: female listeners, of course, they they prefer that deep, husky

158
00:09:03,280 --> 00:09:06,000
Speaker 1: male voice. But again, not only doesn't need to be

159
00:09:06,000 --> 00:09:08,080
Speaker 1: a deep voice, it needs to be that breathy voice.

160
00:09:08,200 --> 00:09:11,959
Speaker 1: And again think of Barry White. Uh, the breathiness to it.

161
00:09:11,960 --> 00:09:14,360
Speaker 1: It has this kind of calmness too, is saying, yeah,

162
00:09:14,360 --> 00:09:16,320
Speaker 1: I'm a big I'm a big guy, but I'm not

163
00:09:16,360 --> 00:09:20,000
Speaker 1: a dangerous guy. I'm an approachable guy. I'm a lovable guy. Uh.

164
00:09:20,600 --> 00:09:24,679
Speaker 1: For instance, John Goodman's voice we're discussing earlier generally does

165
00:09:24,760 --> 00:09:28,120
Speaker 1: not come up as possessing very wide qualities, even though

166
00:09:28,240 --> 00:09:30,600
Speaker 1: John Goodman is UH is of course a big man

167
00:09:30,840 --> 00:09:34,640
Speaker 1: with a very deep, very deep voice. But in most

168
00:09:34,720 --> 00:09:37,320
Speaker 1: of the most like interviews I've seen with him, and

169
00:09:37,320 --> 00:09:39,559
Speaker 1: and certainly in any of his film roles, he tends

170
00:09:39,600 --> 00:09:42,720
Speaker 1: to have a very abrasive quality and and it's kind

171
00:09:42,720 --> 00:09:44,920
Speaker 1: of a fast talker much of the time, and kind

172
00:09:44,920 --> 00:09:48,360
Speaker 1: of a grumbling nature to everything he says that. So

173
00:09:48,400 --> 00:09:50,720
Speaker 1: it doesn't have that breath equality. It doesn't. He doesn't

174
00:09:50,760 --> 00:09:53,520
Speaker 1: have that teddy bear quality that you get with Barry White,

175
00:09:53,640 --> 00:09:57,640
Speaker 1: and that, as this study reveals, that's what UH female

176
00:09:57,640 --> 00:10:00,800
Speaker 1: listeners are supposedly going for. Yeah, the idea is that

177
00:10:00,800 --> 00:10:04,080
Speaker 1: that breathiness kind of mitigates any sort of aggressivity that

178
00:10:04,160 --> 00:10:06,160
Speaker 1: might be perceived in the voice. So you go, oh,

179
00:10:06,200 --> 00:10:10,880
Speaker 1: what a gentle giant. So you'll see information all throughout

180
00:10:10,920 --> 00:10:13,800
Speaker 1: scientific literature that a deep voice is part and parcel

181
00:10:13,960 --> 00:10:18,880
Speaker 1: of sexual selection and that men with low frequency short

182
00:10:19,000 --> 00:10:23,480
Speaker 1: space formats have more sexual hookups. You'll see this in literature.

183
00:10:23,960 --> 00:10:26,720
Speaker 1: In fact, there's a paper by the name of voice

184
00:10:26,760 --> 00:10:30,800
Speaker 1: Pitch Predicts Reprotective Success and Male Hunter Gathers, and it

185
00:10:30,840 --> 00:10:32,920
Speaker 1: bears out the fact that the men of the Hodza

186
00:10:33,000 --> 00:10:38,200
Speaker 1: people are a Tanzanian hunter gathers assired far more children

187
00:10:38,559 --> 00:10:41,840
Speaker 1: than their higher pitched counterparts. That's important to note that

188
00:10:41,880 --> 00:10:44,480
Speaker 1: they went to a secluded community like this to conduct

189
00:10:44,559 --> 00:10:47,080
Speaker 1: this study, because once you start factoring in things like

190
00:10:47,160 --> 00:10:50,920
Speaker 1: birth control, that just kind of excused the whole human

191
00:10:51,000 --> 00:10:54,400
Speaker 1: mating platform. Now, one of the things that excuse this

192
00:10:54,520 --> 00:10:58,760
Speaker 1: idea of lower pitch voices as part and parcel of

193
00:10:58,840 --> 00:11:02,880
Speaker 1: sexual selection. K evolution is a paper published by Lee

194
00:11:02,960 --> 00:11:06,120
Speaker 1: Simmons at All in the December twenty eleven issue of

195
00:11:06,240 --> 00:11:09,440
Speaker 1: p l O S One, and it says, hey, men

196
00:11:09,480 --> 00:11:14,360
Speaker 1: with deeper attractive voices may have lower sperm quality than

197
00:11:14,440 --> 00:11:18,280
Speaker 1: then with less attractive voices. And this was determined by

198
00:11:18,320 --> 00:11:21,360
Speaker 1: seamen analysis which revealed that men with deeper voices have

199
00:11:21,600 --> 00:11:26,640
Speaker 1: lower scores on seven motility parameters. Now we're talking about

200
00:11:26,640 --> 00:11:31,080
Speaker 1: fifty four male participants from the University of Western Australia.

201
00:11:31,200 --> 00:11:33,640
Speaker 1: They were recruited for this and this is just one study,

202
00:11:33,720 --> 00:11:36,680
Speaker 1: but I think it gives you the idea that it's

203
00:11:36,720 --> 00:11:39,360
Speaker 1: not quite as cut and dried as some of the

204
00:11:39,440 --> 00:11:43,439
Speaker 1: literature in the past would put out there. And researchers

205
00:11:43,480 --> 00:11:46,360
Speaker 1: believe that the lower sperm quality reflects a trade off

206
00:11:46,760 --> 00:11:50,880
Speaker 1: that comes with having to compete for mats. Okay, because

207
00:11:50,920 --> 00:11:54,360
Speaker 1: if you were a say this the squirrelier uh mail

208
00:11:54,640 --> 00:11:57,120
Speaker 1: with a higher voice or the sort of annoying voice,

209
00:11:57,720 --> 00:11:59,960
Speaker 1: you you may not get that many shots at the prize.

210
00:12:00,160 --> 00:12:03,040
Speaker 1: So when you do, it's got to count. But if

211
00:12:03,040 --> 00:12:05,360
Speaker 1: you are the very wide of the Kuala world world,

212
00:12:05,440 --> 00:12:08,280
Speaker 1: you know you've got numerous opportunities to at the bullside.

213
00:12:08,800 --> 00:12:10,760
Speaker 1: Alright'm gonna take a quick break and we're going to

214
00:12:10,840 --> 00:12:13,760
Speaker 1: talk about something else that actually maked Trump the Verry

215
00:12:13,760 --> 00:12:17,000
Speaker 1: White and Maryland Monroe voice, and it has to do

216
00:12:17,160 --> 00:12:25,839
Speaker 1: with our own voices. All Right, we are back and

217
00:12:25,920 --> 00:12:30,520
Speaker 1: during the break, um Noel, our producer, myself and Robert

218
00:12:30,679 --> 00:12:34,920
Speaker 1: had this quick little discussion of who could actually take

219
00:12:35,000 --> 00:12:38,040
Speaker 1: on the mantle of Barry White these days, Who is

220
00:12:38,080 --> 00:12:43,720
Speaker 1: the modern Berry White, who can deliver all that sultry fuzziness. Yeah,

221
00:12:43,760 --> 00:12:46,280
Speaker 1: and I was thinking, like I was thinking, okay, John Goodman, No,

222
00:12:46,360 --> 00:12:47,840
Speaker 1: that didn't work. And I was like running through all

223
00:12:47,880 --> 00:12:50,920
Speaker 1: these different names of like sort of big or deep voiced,

224
00:12:51,840 --> 00:12:54,360
Speaker 1: you know, male actors or celebrities, and none of them

225
00:12:54,400 --> 00:12:56,199
Speaker 1: were really clicking. Like all of them just seemed a

226
00:12:56,240 --> 00:12:59,280
Speaker 1: little off. But Noel nailed it. He said, I got it,

227
00:13:00,200 --> 00:13:03,200
Speaker 1: And he said Scarlett Johanson. Yeah, because Scarlett Johnson has

228
00:13:03,240 --> 00:13:07,920
Speaker 1: this wonderful, like husky female voice that I I ventured

229
00:13:07,960 --> 00:13:11,280
Speaker 1: to say a lot of people find attractive. It's great.

230
00:13:11,280 --> 00:13:12,880
Speaker 1: And what I love about it is is this little

231
00:13:12,920 --> 00:13:15,000
Speaker 1: gender twist, because really it's sort of if you took

232
00:13:15,040 --> 00:13:18,160
Speaker 1: all of the best aspects of Marilyn and Rose voice

233
00:13:18,480 --> 00:13:20,920
Speaker 1: and Barry Whites and put it together, and man, I

234
00:13:20,960 --> 00:13:22,680
Speaker 1: would love to have her voice. That would be great.

235
00:13:22,920 --> 00:13:25,360
Speaker 1: It is. It is a really good voice. I've admired

236
00:13:25,400 --> 00:13:28,240
Speaker 1: it since uh was it a ghost World back in

237
00:13:28,240 --> 00:13:32,320
Speaker 1: the day. Yeah, well admired. Well done, Scarlett. All Right,

238
00:13:32,480 --> 00:13:35,640
Speaker 1: So we we may love all the huskiness, the breathiness,

239
00:13:35,640 --> 00:13:38,960
Speaker 1: but it turns out that ultimately we just love to

240
00:13:39,000 --> 00:13:42,839
Speaker 1: hear ourselves in others. That trumps everything. Else. Yeah. A

241
00:13:42,960 --> 00:13:46,400
Speaker 1: new University of British Columbia study finds that we prefer

242
00:13:46,520 --> 00:13:48,960
Speaker 1: voices that are similar to our own. And the reason

243
00:13:49,040 --> 00:13:52,360
Speaker 1: here is because they convey These voices convey a soothing

244
00:13:52,400 --> 00:13:56,520
Speaker 1: sense of community and social belongingness. It's the known quantity

245
00:13:56,640 --> 00:13:59,120
Speaker 1: right right, So we automatically be connect and we begin

246
00:13:59,160 --> 00:14:01,240
Speaker 1: to empathize with some anounce if they sound like us.

247
00:14:01,600 --> 00:14:05,240
Speaker 1: And Molly Babbel great last name, by the way, a

248
00:14:05,320 --> 00:14:08,520
Speaker 1: professor in the Department of Linguistics and her colleagues at

249
00:14:08,520 --> 00:14:12,640
Speaker 1: the University of California, Santa Cruz asked college age participants

250
00:14:12,640 --> 00:14:15,840
Speaker 1: in California to rate the attractiveness of thirty male voices

251
00:14:15,960 --> 00:14:20,320
Speaker 1: and thirty female voices reading isolated words. And these sixty

252
00:14:20,400 --> 00:14:24,240
Speaker 1: voices represent a geographical areas west of the Mississippi River. Now,

253
00:14:24,320 --> 00:14:26,400
Speaker 1: one of the things that stood out is that the

254
00:14:26,760 --> 00:14:30,360
Speaker 1: California folks, the participants had a really strong preference for

255
00:14:30,400 --> 00:14:34,080
Speaker 1: female voices that pronounced the the oo vowel, the double

256
00:14:34,120 --> 00:14:37,840
Speaker 1: o vowel sound from a word like goose further forward

257
00:14:37,880 --> 00:14:42,200
Speaker 1: in the mouth, as opposed to the um sound that

258
00:14:42,320 --> 00:14:46,160
Speaker 1: someone in Fargo, North Dakota might make when saying gorse.

259
00:14:48,000 --> 00:14:51,480
Speaker 1: In that case, the word is originating deeper back in

260
00:14:51,560 --> 00:14:54,680
Speaker 1: the mouth. Yeah, this was This was fascinating because on

261
00:14:54,680 --> 00:14:57,120
Speaker 1: one hand, you have to sort of realize that at

262
00:14:57,120 --> 00:14:59,160
Speaker 1: the end of the day when you're when you're thinking

263
00:14:59,200 --> 00:15:02,960
Speaker 1: about what's attracted and what's not attractive and another human being. Uh,

264
00:15:03,400 --> 00:15:05,760
Speaker 1: You're you're getting down to are these people I want

265
00:15:05,800 --> 00:15:07,640
Speaker 1: to spend time with? Or in the in the case

266
00:15:07,680 --> 00:15:09,720
Speaker 1: of potential mate, is this someone I want to to

267
00:15:09,800 --> 00:15:13,800
Speaker 1: spend an examinant amount of time with? And uh and

268
00:15:13,800 --> 00:15:16,640
Speaker 1: and so you're going to want somebody or you're gonna

269
00:15:16,640 --> 00:15:19,080
Speaker 1: want people that you have things in common with, that

270
00:15:19,120 --> 00:15:22,040
Speaker 1: you share some sort of sense of community. Uh. And

271
00:15:22,080 --> 00:15:25,320
Speaker 1: then this, you know, this goes back through thousands and

272
00:15:25,320 --> 00:15:27,440
Speaker 1: thousands of years of human history. You know, you want

273
00:15:28,360 --> 00:15:30,360
Speaker 1: people need to belong They need to belong to a

274
00:15:30,440 --> 00:15:33,520
Speaker 1: group in order to survive. There's a survival advantage in

275
00:15:33,640 --> 00:15:37,480
Speaker 1: being able to to to sync with those around you. Yeah,

276
00:15:37,480 --> 00:15:39,520
Speaker 1: and I think that it's it's interesting that that is

277
00:15:39,560 --> 00:15:45,280
Speaker 1: more powerful than this sort of veiled idea that breathy voice,

278
00:15:45,400 --> 00:15:49,440
Speaker 1: husky voice is going to deliver on on sex um

279
00:15:49,520 --> 00:15:51,680
Speaker 1: essentially as what we're thinking, right we're thinking about marily

280
00:15:51,720 --> 00:15:54,720
Speaker 1: Monroe or Barry White. Um, and that it really does.

281
00:15:54,800 --> 00:15:59,480
Speaker 1: The sense of community trumps that promise, that suggestion. And

282
00:15:59,720 --> 00:16:02,080
Speaker 1: the only thing that kind of gets in the way

283
00:16:02,080 --> 00:16:06,200
Speaker 1: of this idea of community and familiarity is the foreign

284
00:16:06,440 --> 00:16:10,720
Speaker 1: language paradox. Yes. And I kept thinking about this myself

285
00:16:10,720 --> 00:16:12,680
Speaker 1: when I was reading a lot of this initial stuff,

286
00:16:12,680 --> 00:16:14,520
Speaker 1: because I was thinking, Okay, what are the voices that

287
00:16:14,640 --> 00:16:18,720
Speaker 1: I would say, I, you know, objectively find uh attractive.

288
00:16:19,040 --> 00:16:22,000
Speaker 1: I would say that like a like in male voices,

289
00:16:22,120 --> 00:16:25,120
Speaker 1: like a British accent, and in and in among the ladies,

290
00:16:25,280 --> 00:16:28,600
Speaker 1: a German accent. Really, yeah, like the German accent. I

291
00:16:28,600 --> 00:16:32,000
Speaker 1: don't know, there's something like strong and commanding about a

292
00:16:32,080 --> 00:16:36,560
Speaker 1: German accent. Anyway, Well that's the said even real German,

293
00:16:36,560 --> 00:16:40,160
Speaker 1: I don't. Yeah, that's rapid, my friend. Well but it did.

294
00:16:40,560 --> 00:16:42,400
Speaker 1: I know, you didn't put your heart into it whole

295
00:16:42,520 --> 00:16:46,880
Speaker 1: and far. See Okay, but you're that's okay, So that's

296
00:16:46,920 --> 00:16:51,760
Speaker 1: not a good example. But um, but still are you

297
00:16:51,840 --> 00:16:53,960
Speaker 1: running it for me? But see, so that's what I

298
00:16:54,000 --> 00:16:55,880
Speaker 1: would say if someone had asked me. But of course,

299
00:16:56,280 --> 00:16:58,720
Speaker 1: in reality, I did not marry anyone with a with

300
00:16:58,760 --> 00:17:01,320
Speaker 1: a German accent or a British accent and uh and

301
00:17:01,560 --> 00:17:03,720
Speaker 1: and so I end up sort of defaulting to the

302
00:17:03,800 --> 00:17:06,639
Speaker 1: argument that you end up mirring someone who are choosing

303
00:17:06,640 --> 00:17:09,199
Speaker 1: a partner. It sounds more like you somebody who is

304
00:17:09,359 --> 00:17:12,159
Speaker 1: uh in my case, someone who was raised in the

305
00:17:12,200 --> 00:17:15,440
Speaker 1: South but has like less of the Southern accent. Uh.

306
00:17:15,520 --> 00:17:17,800
Speaker 1: My Michigan people to your right. Now, I wasn't raised

307
00:17:17,840 --> 00:17:20,119
Speaker 1: in the South, okay, but I have been here long

308
00:17:20,240 --> 00:17:22,440
Speaker 1: enough that I've taken on the twang, that's for sure.

309
00:17:23,080 --> 00:17:26,639
Speaker 1: Professor Babbel again, she says that once you're outside of

310
00:17:26,680 --> 00:17:30,720
Speaker 1: a certain range of familiarity, novel and exotic sounding voices

311
00:17:30,840 --> 00:17:33,480
Speaker 1: might become more attractive. She says, we all have to

312
00:17:33,520 --> 00:17:36,240
Speaker 1: keep in mind that we find some accents more preferable

313
00:17:36,240 --> 00:17:40,080
Speaker 1: than others because of social stereotypes that are associated with them.

314
00:17:40,080 --> 00:17:41,439
Speaker 1: And I thought, you know what, I think she's right.

315
00:17:41,480 --> 00:17:42,879
Speaker 1: I'm kind of a sucker for that, because I'm a

316
00:17:42,880 --> 00:17:45,600
Speaker 1: sucker for a British accent, because I think that it it,

317
00:17:45,960 --> 00:17:48,720
Speaker 1: you know, is endowed with a bunch of different things

318
00:17:48,720 --> 00:17:52,720
Speaker 1: for me, like worldliness and wit. Now, of course, both

319
00:17:52,760 --> 00:17:55,040
Speaker 1: of us when we're talking about British accents. We're probably

320
00:17:55,040 --> 00:17:58,640
Speaker 1: talking about very specific British accents. We're thinking thinking more

321
00:17:58,640 --> 00:18:02,280
Speaker 1: about like Ben king Lee and like Tom Hudleston, that

322
00:18:02,359 --> 00:18:07,200
Speaker 1: kind of accent, rather than like a strong Birmingham, England.

323
00:18:07,640 --> 00:18:09,760
Speaker 1: And I'm not thinking Cockney and I'm not thinking Downton

324
00:18:09,760 --> 00:18:13,040
Speaker 1: Abbey either. That the Cockney accent is kind of sexy

325
00:18:13,040 --> 00:18:15,159
Speaker 1: in its own right, you know, I suppose it can

326
00:18:15,200 --> 00:18:18,920
Speaker 1: be yes, but again, the the idea that of an

327
00:18:18,920 --> 00:18:21,879
Speaker 1: exotic voice is a void, and it's a voice that

328
00:18:22,040 --> 00:18:24,520
Speaker 1: is uh, that is new, it's novel and maybe a

329
00:18:24,520 --> 00:18:27,080
Speaker 1: little dangerous, and that does appeal to the novelty seeking

330
00:18:27,240 --> 00:18:30,639
Speaker 1: aspects of an individual. You know, we want new experiences,

331
00:18:30,680 --> 00:18:33,320
Speaker 1: we want new ideas, and we've we've podcasted on this before,

332
00:18:33,440 --> 00:18:36,480
Speaker 1: so you could definitely see where you would gravitate towards

333
00:18:36,680 --> 00:18:39,960
Speaker 1: individuals with those qualities, and you're projecting your fantasies onto that,

334
00:18:40,280 --> 00:18:42,000
Speaker 1: right and and it's kind of so we end up

335
00:18:42,000 --> 00:18:44,840
Speaker 1: seeing the situation where there's there the voices that sound

336
00:18:44,880 --> 00:18:47,200
Speaker 1: like our own, and those are cherished, and then there's

337
00:18:47,240 --> 00:18:49,760
Speaker 1: the voices far away that sound nothing like our own,

338
00:18:50,080 --> 00:18:52,399
Speaker 1: and those are cherished. It's that gulf in between that

339
00:18:52,520 --> 00:18:54,680
Speaker 1: just turns us off, you know, like they're saying they're

340
00:18:55,080 --> 00:18:57,040
Speaker 1: they're there, their vowe, their vowels are coming out just

341
00:18:57,080 --> 00:18:59,800
Speaker 1: a little weird, and I don't like it. It's the other, right,

342
00:19:00,000 --> 00:19:01,840
Speaker 1: it's a and we always have a fear of the other.

343
00:19:02,040 --> 00:19:04,520
Speaker 1: So it's interesting to see it played out like that.

344
00:19:05,359 --> 00:19:07,600
Speaker 1: All right. So that's pretty much an overview of your

345
00:19:07,640 --> 00:19:11,159
Speaker 1: Barry White, your mail women rose out there. Also, I

346
00:19:11,280 --> 00:19:14,160
Speaker 1: have a video on this topic, and in it, I'm

347
00:19:14,200 --> 00:19:18,960
Speaker 1: going to reveal the real reason why Marilyn Monroe spoke

348
00:19:19,080 --> 00:19:24,600
Speaker 1: like a di ide then and revoiced gal. Interesting. Yeah,

349
00:19:24,760 --> 00:19:27,240
Speaker 1: I can't reveal it here. You gotta go to uh

350
00:19:27,440 --> 00:19:31,480
Speaker 1: YouTube mind stuff show. Check out also stuff to Alow

351
00:19:31,520 --> 00:19:33,680
Speaker 1: your mind dot com that of course is the mothership.

352
00:19:33,880 --> 00:19:36,480
Speaker 1: You'll find links out to all of our stuff. There.

353
00:19:36,560 --> 00:19:40,440
Speaker 1: You'll find links to our Facebook, our Twitter, our tumbler page,

354
00:19:40,600 --> 00:19:43,520
Speaker 1: or Google Plus, uh you name it. We probably signed

355
00:19:43,560 --> 00:19:45,920
Speaker 1: up for a one point or another, and as well

356
00:19:45,960 --> 00:19:48,440
Speaker 1: as all of our our podcast episodes going all the

357
00:19:48,440 --> 00:19:50,639
Speaker 1: way back through our history. You'll find all of our

358
00:19:50,640 --> 00:19:52,760
Speaker 1: blog posts. Stuff to blow your mind dot com check

359
00:19:52,760 --> 00:19:55,080
Speaker 1: it out, throw some traffic. We love it when you

360
00:19:55,160 --> 00:19:56,760
Speaker 1: do so If you guys have some thoughts on this,

361
00:19:56,920 --> 00:19:59,760
Speaker 1: You see that Marilyn Monroe video and you have some questions,

362
00:19:59,880 --> 00:20:02,480
Speaker 1: or you you've got a qualm there about some Marilynon

363
00:20:02,560 --> 00:20:05,520
Speaker 1: Row stuff, or you have some ideas about Barry White

364
00:20:05,640 --> 00:20:08,040
Speaker 1: and the reasons why we were attracted to certain voices.

365
00:20:08,320 --> 00:20:11,280
Speaker 1: You can email us at blow the Mind at Discovery

366
00:20:11,480 --> 00:20:18,040
Speaker 1: dot com for more on this and thousands of other

367
00:20:18,080 --> 00:20:26,920
Speaker 1: topics because it how stuff works dot com