In defense of stylistic diversity in speech research

Recently, the debate about what kind of speech data is most appropriate for linguistic research has intensified. Generally, with 'laboratory speech' defenders on the one hand and 'natural speech' proponents on the other, two seemingly clearly distinct phonetic data types have been identified. In this article, this dichotomy is called into question. Results from previous studies on segmental phonetics, prosody and paralinguistics indicate that the data we are using may indeed have had an immense influence on our results. The research papers in the present Special Issue in Journal of Phonetics provide further evidence for the style-dependency of speech data and hence, on our theories and models. Importantly, they also show that some results remain stable independently of the speaking style under investigation. We claim that these findings do not point to an inherent superiority of one particular type of data used in phonetics research. Instead, we argue for a stronger methodological awareness in investigations of speech phenomena and more cautious interpretations of the findings that we make. We also believe that we need a much better understanding of the extent to which our methods and our ways of collecting speech data influence our results. A generally increased methodological awareness and a higher variety of investigated styles of speech will promote our research progress further than a continuing argument for or against using one particular type of speech data.