Segment 44 – And They Say I Speak Fast! Speech Tempo

Have you ever been in a foreign country, armed with your pocket dictionary, and a few years of high school foreign Language classes… and been lost? What do you do? Just pop into that little store and ask someone for directions… 

Sure, sounds simple enough… then you finally get up enough nerve to walk into the gas station and meekly ask the man “Perdone, ¿dónde está el mercado?"  [Whew! Did it without stuttering!]

He smiles, responds nicely, “Sí, por supuesto señora…” then begins to give you directions that are about 10 minutes long and so fast it makes your head spin...You politely nod your head, say thanks, smile and return to the car, where your companion eagerly asks “So…did you get the directions?” You reply, “Yep, he told me…but I didn’t catch a word of what he said!”

Welcome to the story of my life! I’ve traveled to many countries, always embracing the different cultures, food, people and languages. I’ve always made an effort to at least learn a bit of the language and carry a travel guide and pocket dictionary – in some cases, I’ve even taken a crash course in a particular language. But these books and classes, never quite prepare me for the speech tempo and information density of the language.  

What is speech tempo? Well, in simple terms, it is how fast a language is spoken. It is commonly measured by syllables per second.  Speech tempo measurements can include or exclude pauses and hesitations.  Speech tempo will vary according to contextual and emotional factors, between individuals, and also among different languages and dialects.

Let’s take English… studies show that the typical speaking rate for English is 4 syllables per second, but variations based on context and emotional factors often apply, ranges between 3.3 and 5.9 syl/sec have been reported by linguistic experts. And significant differences in speaking rates can be heard between different activities such as story-telling, teaching, and interviewing. Regional influences also play a big part, have you ever heard an American Southern drawl? If not, pay a visit to Kentucky USA, or anywhere south of the Mason-Dixon line for that matter… but you “oughtn't be in a hurry”.

OK, some people speak faster than others, but how about the amount of information, or information density delivered in a given phrase or sentence? Sure one’s speech tempo may be fast, but how does it compare to the amount of information delivered?   This is where it gets interesting because this can be demonstrated by comparing foreign languages and cultural factors.  Does it take more or less words to get the same meaning across in a particular language?

If you take text and translate into different languages, and then have a native deliver the text naturally, what would happen? This has been done by  numerous linguistic studies [2011, Université de Lyon], and the findings actually concur with my own – unscientific (yet practical) experiences.

• Quickly spoken languages tend to contain less information per syllable. ie. more words to express a particular idea. So the speaker tends to say the words fast “to get it all in.”

• Languages spoken more slowly tend to contain more information per syllable. ie. less words to express a particular idea. The chosen words may be more descriptive or complex.

Mandarin was shown to contain the most information per syllable. In terms of speed, delivery is slower with a more complex structure and greater information density. eg. For example when introducing one’s uncle in Mandarin, the speaker will use terms that not only mentions the uncle, "This is my uncle," the Mandarin language would force the speaker to disclose whether or not this is an uncle on his/her mother's or father's side, whether this is an uncle by marriage or by birth, if this uncle is the speaker’s father's brother, whether he is older than or younger than the speaker’s father. Ie. the chosen terms to express a particular idea would be more complex, not necessarily more words, but more specific and descriptive.

• Japanese contained the least information density, yet one of the quickest speaking languages (second to Spanish). 
• Spanish had the lowest information density of all European languages, and was the fastest spoken language. 
• Mandarin and Spanish have almost the same average information rate with two opposite strategies: slower, denser, more complex [the former] vs. faster, less dense, less complex [the latter].
• While Spanish is the fastest spoken European language, German is the slowest.
• For English, the information density is highest compared to other European languages.

So what does all of this say? A couple of things… 

1. Be prepared to adjust to the language’s tempo when speaking with natives. 
2. Be prepared for TMI [too much info] or vagueness in explanations and responses, depending on the language.

If you’ve ever wondered why English movies and videos dubbed in Chinese never quite synch up to scenes precisely – now you know. And why Japanese movies and videos dub quite well into Spanish – they have similar speech tempo and information density rates.

Sometimes, you can say more with less… 

As for English, I tend to gage the level of “information density” required based on my audience and how much time I have on my hands at the moment.  Maybe the ancient Egyptians had it right with hieroglyphs… but that discussion has more to do with written language rather than spoken… we'll tackle that another time.  

… Stay tuned for the next Segment of HT Localization Presents Language Translations for Real Life Series, where we’ll continue … with more stuff.

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This article was written by Rachanee Thevenet, Co-Founder of HT Localization.  Rachanee is an Asian-American expat living in Spain with her family.  She loves all things international including food, art, literature, culture, languages and people.  She has years of professional product marketing expertise and global expansion experience.

HT Localization, LLC. is a worldwide translation & localization agency providing a full range of professional language translation services, including social media localization, marketing translations, website translations, software localization, eLearning materials, documentation translations, etc.  With locations in the US, Spain, France, Zambia & Thailand, and coverage across all languages and most industries, HT Localization is well positioned to provide around the globe services for all translation needs.  

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