Comparison of Habitual and High Pitch Phonation in Teachers With and Without Vocal Fatigue

Abstract

The main aim of this study was to investigate whether or not high pitch phonation can be used for assessing the vocal loading model. For this purpose, habitual and high pitch phonations were compared between teachers with and without vocal fatigue. Sixty teachers (30 teachers with vocal fatigue and 30 teachers without vocal fatigue) participated in the present study. From both the groups of teachers, habitual and high pitch phonations were recorded. Fundamental frequency measures (mean, minimum, and maximum fundamental frequency), percent Jitter (Jitt), relative average perturbation (RAP), pitch perturbation quotient (PPQ), smoothened pitch perturbation quotient (SPPQ), noise-to-harmonic ratio (NHR), cepstral peak prominence (CPP), and smoothened cepstral peak prominence (CPPS) measurements were extracted from the recorded samples. The different acoustic measurements were compared across the two phonations and two groups of teachers. Significant decrease in mean, minimum, and maximum fundamental frequency values were found in high pitch phonation in teachers with vocal fatigue when compared with teachers without vocal fatigue. However, there was no significant difference between the two groups of participants for any of the acoustic measurements during the habitual phonation. Current results highlight that high pitch phonation may serve as a better sensitive sample than habitual phonation as an indicator to assess vocal fatigue in teachers. Hence, further studies need to be done with different professional voice users to early identify those individuals who are susceptible to develop voice problems.