Your Voice Age Reveals How Fast You're Aging

Scientists have developed an innovative computer tool, dubbed a "speech clock," capable of estimating a person's age based on vocal cues. The tool analyzes speech rate, pitch, and vocabulary, finding that younger-sounding speech is typically faster and more fluent than that of older individuals.

When tested, the "speech clock" sometimes identified voices as older than their owners' chronological age. These individuals were more prone to exhibiting markers of biological aging, cognitive decline, and dementia. This suggests the tool could potentially screen patients for neurological conditions.

Published in Science Advances, the study involved nearly 3,000 Spanish-speaking participants across five South American countries. A "speech age gap" was calculated, revealing disparities between chronological and vocal age. Larger gaps correlated with poorer performance in memory and planning tests, even non-verbal ones, and were linked to biological indicators like older-looking brains on scans and specific DNA changes.

Notably, participants with Alzheimer's disease showed a significant speech age gap, associated with elevated levels of the protein p-tau217. The study also found that voices sounding older than actual age were linked to social disadvantages, including less education and financial hardship. The accessibility of speech analysis, which can be recorded remotely and inexpensively, offers a promising complement to costly traditional diagnostic methods.