Electrodermal activity and speech features as predictors for arousal level changes after affective word pronunciation

This work explores the possibility of estimating subject arousal through the analysis of speech and electrodermal activity (EDA). One critical issue to be clarified is the reliability of EDA signal during speech production. To accomplish this task, a relation among EDA, speech activity and subject arousal during isolated affective word pronunciation task, will be investigated. The results show that significant information on subject arousal can be still obtained by analyzing EDA during speech. In fact, a significant relationship between EDA features and self-reported arousal can be observed. In addition, a quantitative linear model relating EDA- and speech-related features could be identified. These preliminary results indicate how the analysis of concurrent acquisition of EDA and speech deserves further attention and could offer a valid approach for the prediction of subject arousal during speech production, as a method for validating self-assessment ratings.