In the '90s there were valley girls. Now, according to a new study by California scientists, valley boys are on the rise.
Scientists at the University of California, San Diego found that more young men are beginning to "uptalk," a style of speech where the voice rises in pitch at the end of a sentence. Uptalkers are often stereotyped as young, unintelligent and flighty women. It's also known as "valley girl" talk, made popular by the 90s movie "Clueless" which took place in California.
In the study, scientists recorded the voices of 12 men and 12 women from southern California with diverse backgrounds. The men and women were asked to talk about certain subjects, such as giving directions or retelling what happened in a TV show, the Daily Mail reported. All of the men uptalked.
"We found use of uptalk in all of our speakers, despite their diverse backgrounds in socioeconomic status, ethnicity, bilingualism and gender," said Amanda Ritchart, a linguist who led the study, the Daily Mail reported.
Yet according to another study, men's use of uptalk may not bode well for them. A study of 792 men at Duke University found the lower a man's voice, the more powerful job he had and the more money he earned, according to the Daily Mail. .
The California study, presented at the yearly meeting of the Acoustical Society of America, also detected a subtle difference between the way test subjects asked a question and made a statement. When making a statement, the uptalker's rise in pitch began much later than if a question was asked, the Daily Mail reported. The difference is something only people from southern California would notice.
"Our study busts the stereotype associated with uptalk that those who speak uptalk actually ask questions instead of make statements, a tendency that is suppose to be linked to insecurity," said Amalia Arvaniti a professor involved in the study, according to the Daily Mail.
