Fact · Voice and AI
100milliseconds
Stivers and colleagues report that speakers become hypersensitive to changes in the timing of responses of 100 milliseconds or less.
Checked against its source on October 17, 2026
In the source's own words
“Speakers become hypersensitive to perturbations in timing of responses, measured in 100 ms or less.”
Universals and cultural variation in turn-taking in conversation, Tanya Stivers et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2009, Results on response timing across ten languages.
Open the original (DOI 10.1073/pnas.0903616106)- What it measures
- The study timed turn transitions in conversations in ten languages. The authors say listeners notice small changes in response timing.
- What it does not show
- Describes human conversation. It shows how sensitive listeners are, but it does not test machine replies.