Voices reveal personality in an instant

YOU had me at “Hello”. It takes less than a second to form an impression of someone’s personality from their voice. We know that our voices can transmit subtle signals about gender, age, even personality, but Philip McAleer at the University  of Glasgow, UK, and his colleagues wondered whether we make an instant impression. They recorded 64 people reading a passage, then extracted the word “hello” and asked 320 people to rate the voices for 10 perceived personality traits. Each clip lasted just 390 milliseconds. “We were surprised by just how similar people’s ratings were,” says McAleer. Using a scale in which 0 represents no agreement on a perceived trait and 1 reflects complete agreement, all 10 traits averaged 0.92 – meaning most people agreed very closely on  how far each voice represented  a trait. (PLoS One, doi.org/rww). The impression that our voices convey seems to be down to several factors. For example, pitch influenced how trustworthy a person seemed. It makes evolutionary sense that decisions about personality should happen fast, says McAleer. “You want to quickly know if you can trust a person so you can approach them or run away".