Voice Quality / Set

嗓音音质/式样

A term used in phonetics to refer to the permanently present, background, person-identifying feature of speech. All phonetic features contribute to this notion: an individual’s voice quality derives from a combination of such factors as pitch height, loudness level, tempo and timbre of speaking. Labels for the many qualities that can be produced tend to be impressionistic and ambiguous, e.g. a ‘cheery’, ‘haughty’, ‘sullen’ voice. A terminological problem also arises because such labels may be used both in a non-linguistic way (as described above) and in a linguistic or paralinguistic context, as when someone who normally does not have a voice one would call ‘sullen’ deliberately adopts such a voice to communicate a particular emotional state. To classify such latter effects, terms such as voice qualifier or ‘paralinguistic feature’ are available, but ‘voice quality’ is also commonly used.

语音学用来指永久存在的、背景上的、能识别说话人的言语特征。所有的语音特征都能影响嗓音音质：个人的嗓音音质是音高、响度、音速和音色这些因素综合产生的结果。给许多音质起的名称往往是凭印象，因而不明确，例如“愉悦声”、“轻蔑声”、“沉闷声”等。术语问题还表现在这类名称既有非语言学的用法（如上所述）又有语言学或副语言学的用法，例如某人平时的嗓音没有所谓的“沉闷声”，但为了传递某种特殊的感情而故意带上这种音质。为界定后一类效应，可以采用音饰或“副语言特征”这样的术语，但“嗓音音质”一语也很常用。