What’s in a singer’s voice: The effect of attachment, emotions and trauma

Abstract

Research shows that negative experiences in childhood have a long-lasting impact on one’s psychological outcomes and one’s physiology. The voice is a crucial means of expression, and its complex physiology is believed to be reflective of emotional and mental states. Parenting practices (particularly those contributing to insecure attachment) and traumatic experiences in childhood may thus also influence vocal characteristics. Except for literature on psychogenic voice disorders, the relationship between such experiences and the ‘normal’ voice is generally unexplored; we propose that a potential relationship is most likely to emerge in singers, for whom the voice is a more central part of their sense of self. In this paper, we test the hypothesis that vocal characteristics relate to attachment and trauma history. Study 1: 25 singers (age 18–35) completed an attachment history questionnaire (ECR-R) and the Singing Voice Handicap Index. Voice range profile and perturbation measures were recorded and analyzed for voice quality assessment. Study 2: 26 singers (age 19–33) completed the attachment history questionnaire, the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire, and the State and Trait Anxiety Inventory. They were also administered the Test of Self-Conscious Affect to assess shame and guilt proneness. Voice range profile, perturbation, and spectrogram measures were recorded and analyzed. The results indicated that anxious attachment, shame, and emotional neglect can predict vocal acoustic measures of intensity and, to some extent, perturbation. This suggests the need to address attachment, shame, and trauma history patterns in the aspiring performer.