Gender, age and settlement related changes in vowel duration: A study with relation to Kashmiri

Abstract

The research article compared the duration of 16 vowels among four age groups of male and female Kashmiri speakers to determine the relationship of vowel duration with gender, aging, and settlement. Recordings for 16 monosyllabic words of /hVtʰ/ structure, with each word having one of the 16 vowels of the language, were taken from a total of 24 males and 24 females, each divided into four age groups of 20-30 years, 31-40 years, 41-50 years, and 50 years and above. Half of the females and males were from rural Kashmir and half were from Urban Kashmir. The results revealed significant differences in duration between males and females, progressive increase in duration with increase in age and certain differences in duration between rural and urban speakers. Acoustic analysis of speech samples was carried using PRAAT.