Perceived Voice Quality Research Articles

Analysis of the Auditory-Perceptual Voice Quality in Older and Younger Adults Without Self-Reported Voice Complaints.

The objectives of this study were to compare the auditory perceptual voice quality in young and older adults who had no self-reported voice complaints and to investigate the relationship of voice quality with age and gender in older adults. This is a retrospective study. This study included 114 participants. The study group comprised 57 older adults (24 men, 33 women) with a mean age of 72.6±0.76 years, while the control group included 57 young adults matched by gender. All participants reported no voice complaints and scored less than 19 points on the Voice Handicap Index. Clinicians applied the GRBAS (Grade, Roughness, Breathiness, Asthenia, and Strain) auditory perceptual assessment protocol to evaluate the voice quality of the participants of the study and control groups. More than half of the study group (50.9%) were rated as having mild voice abnormality (G1) based on the GRBAS auditory perceptual assessment protocol, while 21.1% exhibited moderate (G2). In contrast, only 19.3% of the control group participants had mild voice abnormality. The study group demonstrated statistically worse voice quality compared to the control group. Furthermore, participants over 75 years of age had statistically higher G ratings compared to those under 75. No significant difference was found between the G category and gender in older adults. The present study's findings indicate that compared to younger adults, older adults perceive voice quality deviation less than clinicians do. Furthermore, it is found that the deviation in voice quality among older adults was influenced by age but not by gender. This study highlights the need for screening and early identification/prevention of voice disorders in older adults.

How well do acoustic parameters correlate our perception of voice quality?

Auditory perceptual judgments are essential for assessing voice disorders and monitoring treatment progress. This study aimed to examine the acoustic foundations of perceived abnormalities in individuals with and without voice disorders, focusing on the correlation between the Grade, Roughness, Breathiness, Asthenia, Strain (GRBAS) scale and various acoustic parameters. A total of 1217 voice recordings were obtained from the Perceptual Voice Qualities Database (PVQD) and the Saarbruecken Voice Database (SVD). Each recording was perceptually evaluated by five experienced speech therapists based on the GRBAS scale. Only ratings of more than 80% inter-rater agreement was used for further analysis. Acoustic analyses were obtained using Parselmouth, a Python library for the Praat software. Statistical analysis using Spearman’s rank correlation revealed strong correlations between spectral and cepstral results and GRBAS scale. Specifically, the Grade and Breathiness components showed significant negative correlations with the CPPS parameters, with and without voice detection. There was a strong inverse relationship between Harmonics-to-Noise Ratio (HNR) and the Grade and Roughness. Jitter and shimmer demonstrated robust positive correlations with Grade, Breathiness, and Roughness. These findings provide valuable insights into the relationships between acoustic parameters and perceptual GRBAS scale, informing future research and clinical practice in voice and speech pathology.

Toward Sham Interventions for Behavioral Voice Treatment Outcome Research in Female Students Without Dysphonia

To develop sham voice treatment techniques to be used in voice treatment outcomeresearch, and to investigate their effectiveness as sham. This entails that the techniques induce no changes in voice or voice physiology, yet still lead to a perception of efficacy. Prospective randomized blinded controlled study. Three distinct sham intervention protocols (SIPs) were conceptualized as placebic comparators for three common voice treatment approaches with focus on vocalization (SIP1), respiration (SIP2), and manipulation (SIP3). Forty-eight female students participated in the study. Each participant attended ten 30-minute sessions over 5weeks, including a baseline evaluation, three sessions of one SIP, an inter-SIP voice assessment, three sessions of a second SIP, and a final post-SIPassessment. Auditory-perceptual and instrumental voice evaluations were used as voice treatment outcomemeasures. The participants' perception of voice-related quality of life was evaluated using the French Voice Handicap Index (VHIFR). Frequentist as well as Bayesian statistical methods were applied for group comparisons. The effects of combining two SIPs, the potential influence of SIP order, and experimenter/clinician effects, were also investigated. The respiration-based SIP2 showed changes only in sound intensity level on asustained vowel across the three sham intervention sessions. In contrast, the vocalization-based SIP1 impacted sound intensity level on asustained vowel, sound intensity level on read text, and maximum phonation time. The manipulation-based SIP3 affected smoothed cepstral peak prominence on read text, Acoustic Voice Quality Index, and Dysphonia Severity Index. SIP2 thus demonstrated the highest alignment with the study's objectives, followed by SIP1 and SIP3. GRBASI ratings revealed no statistical differences for any SIP. VHIFr decreased significantly after all three SIPs. Combining the SIPs generally replicated the effects observed when each SIP was used individually. There was no order effect or experimenter/clinician effect on the results. This study demonstrated significant changes in participants' perceived voice quality (measured with VHIFr) across various SIPs, despite minimal impact on objective voice function measures. Further investigation is necessary to establish one or more protocols as genuinely sham interventions.

Hybrid SPEAK OUT! protocol improves aerodynamic measurements and PROMs in Parkinson's disease.

SPEAK OUT! has been shown to enhance various aspects of voice such as intensity, prosody, voice quality and perception of voice. However, their impacts on expiration and communication effectiveness have not yet been evaluated. This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of the Hybrid SPEAK OUT! method on aerodynamic measurements and patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) in individuals with Parkinson's disease (PD). This study included 157 participants with PD who underwent an intensive 8-week multidisciplinary treatment program. The Hybrid SPEAK OUT! method consisted of three sessions per week, including two group sessions and one individual treatment session. Voice-related aerodynamic measures included maximum phonation time (MPT), vocal cord function using the S/Z ratio, and expiratory flow measures including peakexpiratoryflow (PEF) and peak cough flow (PCF). Two PROMs were included: the Hebrew version of the voice handicap index-10 and communication effectiveness questionnaire. The results of 111 participants were analysed. MPT duration increased, PEF and PCF increased, and better scores were found in PROMs. These findings would appear to support the effectiveness of the Hybrid SPEAK OUT! methods improving function, activity and participation in individuals with PD. However, further research is needed. What is already known on the subject Prior research has demonstrated the effectiveness of behavioral therapies, including the SPEAK OUT! program, in managing speech symptoms in individuals with Parkinson's disease (PD). These therapies have shown improvements in voice intensity, fundamental frequency, voice quality, and voice perception. However, the impact on aerodynamic measures, expiratory flow, and patient-reported outcome measures has not been extensively studied. What this paper adds to existing knowledge This study adds to the existing knowledge by demonstrating that a Hybrid SPEAK OUT! approach, can lead to improvements in aerodynamic measures, including maximum phonation time (MPT), expiratory and cough peak flow. In terms of motor learning, we found that two non-speech exhalation-related tasks that were not directly trained improved following the intensive speech training protocol. Furthermore, it shows positive changes in patient-reported outcome measures, with reduced voice-related disability and improved communication efficiency. What are the potential or actual clinical implications of this work? The findings of this study have important clinical implications for the management of speech symptoms in individuals with PD. The Hybrid SPEAK OUT! program, which combines group and individual sessions, can effectively improve voice, aerodynamic measurements and patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs), ultimately enhancing the overall quality of life for patients. These findings support the effectiveness of the Hybrid SPEAK OUT! methods for improving function, activity, and participation in individuals with PD.

Effect of Face Masks on Voice Quality Associated with Young and Older Chinese Adult Speakers

Face masks have become important after the pandemic, but the change in voice when wearing a face mask is still unclear. The study investigated the effect of face masks on the acoustic and perceptual characteristics of voice quality associated with young and older Chinese adults. Voice samples of the sustained vowel /a/ and continuous speech produced by 44 older and 61 young adults with and without an ASTM level-3 surgical face mask were recorded and analyzed. Perceptual and acoustic parameters including mean fundamental frequency (F0) and intensity, perturbation measures (jitter and shimmer), harmonic-to-noise ratio (HNR), smoothed cepstral peak prominence (CPPs), and long-term average spectrum (LTAS) measures were obtained and compared. When comparing masked to unmasked voices, for both male and female speakers, F0 and intensity showed no significant changes, except for F0 of continuous speech, which increased significantly. Meanwhile, perturbation measures such as jitter and shimmer were reduced, while HNR and CPPs increased. In addition, LTAS measures included low-frequency mean spectral energy (MSE), high-frequency MSE, and spectral tilt (ST), which were different. For perceptual measures, the overall grade of dysphonia, and roughness were reduced, except for the breathiness among older male speakers, while the other vocal qualities were not changed. Between young and older speakers, significant differences in shimmer, CPPs, and perceived breathiness among male speakers, and low-frequency MSE among female speakers were found. Wearing a surgical mask appeared to change the perceived voice quality. This is supported by the change in perturbation and LTAS measures, and HNR and CPPs values. In addition, some differences between young and older adults were observed. Oral Communication effectiveness may be affected when wearing surgical masks due to changes in voice quality. Additionally, clinicians need to exercise hightened caution in evaluating the voice quality of clients when wearing face masks.

PrEgg: A free and open source Praat script for electroglottography measurements

Electroglottography is a popular method of phonation analysis due to its non-invasive nature. In order to ease the extraction of systematic EGG measures, we wrote PrEgg, an open source Praat script designed to extract Contact Quotient (CQ), Skew Quotient (SQ) and Peak Increase in Contact (PIC) values. The script offers two measures for CQ and SQ, calculated using the EGG threshold method developed by Rothenberg (1988) and the DEGG method from Henrich et al. (2004), and PIC is further calculated from the DEGG signal. To test the validity of the script, we ran the Praat script on EGG data on Yi provided in the “Production and Perception of Linguistic Voice Quality” project at UCLA. We compared our results on CQ measurements using both the threshold method and the DEGG method with the provided CQ and CQPM measurements extracted from EggWorks, a UCLA software. Overall results are comparable between PrEgg and EggWorks. PrEgg is accompanied by a manual and available at https://github.com/maypychan/praat-egg.

Characterizing Dysphonia After Pediatric Open Airway Reconstruction: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.

Pediatric laryngotracheal stenosis often requires open airway reconstruction. While these surgeries establish an airway for adequate ventilation, many patients develop subsequent dysphonia. Numerous studies have reported outcomes related to voice. This study aims to evaluate dysphonia in pediatric patients following open airway reconstruction, focusing on acoustic parameters, perceptual voice quality, and voice-related quality of life. A comprehensive search using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines across 6 databases identified articles involving pediatric patients who underwent open airway reconstruction and reported postoperative vocal acoustic parameters, perceptual voice quality, voice-related quality of life, or vocal mechanics. Articles were assessed for bias risk, and common outcomes were synthesized qualitatively and quantitatively using meta-analyses. Among 4089 articles, 21 were included, involving 497 pediatric patients. Laryngotracheoplasty was the most common procedure followed by cricotracheal resection. The Consensus Auditory-Perceptual Evaluation of Voice (CAPE-V) scale was frequently used to assess voice quality, with a mean score of 55.6 [95% confidence intervals (CIs): 47.9-63.3]. Voice-related quality of life was measured using the pediatric Voice Handicap Index (pVHI) and Pediatric Voice-Related Quality of Life Survey, with mean scores of 35.6 (95% CI: 21.4-49.7) and 83.7 (95% CI: 74.1-93.2), respectively. The fundamental frequency was 210.5 (95% CI: 174.6-246.3). Other common findings included supraglottic phonation, anterior commissure blunting, posterior glottic diastasis, and abnormal vocal cord mobility. Pediatric patients experiencing dysphonia after open airway reconstruction exhibited moderately decreased voice quality and reduced voice-related quality of life. However, there was inconsistency in study protocols and outcome measures used. Preserving voice quality during airway reconstruction is crucial to avoid negative impacts on quality of life.

Direct subthalamic nucleus stimulation influences speech and voice quality in Parkinson's disease patients

DBS of the subthalamic nucleus (STN) considerably ameliorates cardinal motor symptoms in PD. Reported STN-DBS effects on secondary dysarthric (speech) and dysphonic symptoms (voice), as originating from vocal tract motor dysfunctions, are however inconsistent with rather deleterious outcomes based on post-surgical assessments. To parametrically and intra-operatively investigate the effects of deep brain stimulation (DBS) on perceptual and acoustic speech and voice quality in Parkinson's disease (PD) patients. We performed an assessment of instantaneous intra-operative speech and voice quality changes in PD patients (n=38) elicited by direct STN stimulations with variations of central stimulation features (depth, laterality, and intensity), separately for each hemisphere. First, perceptual assessments across several raters revealed that certain speech and voice symptoms could be improved with STN-DBS, but this seems largely restricted to right STN-DBS. Second, computer-based acoustic analyses of speech and voice features revealed that both left and right STN-DBS could improve dysarthric speech symptoms, but only right STN-DBS can considerably improve dysphonic symptoms, with left STN-DBS being restricted to only affect voice intensity features. Third, several subareas according to stimulation depth and laterality could be identified in the motoric STN proper and close to the associative STN with optimal (and partly suboptimal) stimulation outcomes. Fourth, low-to-medium stimulation intensities showed the most optimal and balanced effects compared to high intensities. STN-DBS can considerably improve both speech and voice quality based on a carefully arranged stimulation regimen along central stimulation features.

Geriatric Voice: Distinctive Clinical Profiles of Working Seniors in a Tertiary Laryngology Clinic

Voice disorders have been reported in up to 47% of the geriatric population. Few studies have assessed dysphonia in the elderly, with none examining vocal function in working seniors. This study aims to profile the clinical characteristics of individuals aged 65years and older, comparing working and non-working seniors. Retrospective cohort study. Medical charts were reviewed for patients aged 65years and older referred to the McGill University Health Centre Laryngology Clinic (January 2018-March 2020). Variables studied included sociodemographics, comorbidities, voice complaints, lifestyle factors, diagnoses, voice acoustics [maximum phonation time (MPT), S/Z ratio, F0], GRBAS scale, Voice Handicap Index-10 (VHI-10), Reflux Symptom Index (RSI), and treatment modalities. A total of 267 patients were included, with a mean [standard deviation (SD)] age of 74.2 (6.6) years and 61% of female patients. Occupation information was available in 148 cases, of which 31.1% were still working and 12.8% were professional voice users. The predominant voice complaint was dysphonia/hoarseness (48.8%) and the most prevalent diagnosis was presbyphonia (31.8%). The mean (SD) VHI-10 and RSI scores were 19.8 (9.0) and 18.7 (9.4) points, respectively. Voice therapy was prescribed for 155 patients (58.7%): 124 attended at least one session with significant post-treatment improvements in the GRBAS and VHI-10 scores (P<0.01). In the univariate analysis, working seniors had a significantly more prevalent singing habit (P=0.04) and laryngopharyngeal reflux diagnosis (P=0.01), displaying a significantly longer MPT (P<0.001) and lower G-B-S scores (P<0.05). After adjusting mean differences, only MPT and the G-S scores were significantly different between both groups. The predominant diagnosis in elders with voice complaints was presbyphonia. Voice therapy proved effective in improving the VHI-10 and GRBAS scores for geriatric patients. Almost one-third of seniors remained in the workforce, demonstrating superior vocal profiles, specifically in the MPT and the grade and strain of perceptual voice quality.

Screening of Voice Pathologies: Identifying the Predictive Value of Voice Acoustic Parameters for Common Voice Pathologies

Voice acoustic analysis is important for objectively assessing voice production and diagnosing voice disorders. This study aimed to investigate the sensitivity of various voice acoustic parameters in differentiating common voice pathology types. Data from the publicly available Perceptual Voice Qualities Database were analyzed; the database includes recordings of participants with and without voice disorders. A wide range of acoustic parameters was estimated from the recordings, such as alpha ratio, harmonics-to-noise ratio (HNR), cepstral peak prominence smoothed (CPPS), pitch period entropy (PPE), fundamental frequency, jitter, shimmer, and sound pressure levels. The predictive capabilities of the parameters were evaluated using receiver operating characteristic curves. Linear regression analysis determined the associations between parameters and voice disorders. Principal component analysis was conducted to identify important parameters for distinguishing voice disorders. This study has identified significant differences in acoustic parameters between those with and without voice disorders. Notably, the combination of five parameters-namely, PPE, shimmer, jitter, CPPS, and HNR-was identified as a strong predictor in voice disorder screening. These findings contribute substantially to the field of voice disorders, offering valuable insights for screening and diagnosis.

Validation of an AI-assisted Treatment Outcome Measure for Gender-Affirming Voice Care: Comparing AI Accuracy to Listener’s Perception of Voice Femininity

There is currently a lack of objective treatment outcome measures for transgender individuals undergoing gender-affirming voice care. Recently, Bensoussan et al developed an AI model that is able to generate a voice femininity rating based on a short voice sample provided through a smartphone application. The purpose of this study was to examine the feasibility of using this model as a treatment outcome measure by comparing its performance to human listeners. Additionally, we examined the effect of two different training datasets on the model's accuracy and performance when presented with external data. 100 voice recordings from 50 cisgender males and 50 cisgender females were retrospectively collected from patients presenting at a university voice clinic for reasons other than dysphonia. The recordings were evaluated by expert and naïve human listeners, who rated each voice based on how sure they were the voice belonged to a female speaker (% voice femininity [R]). Human ratings were compared to ratings generated by (1) the AI model trained on a high-quality low-quantity dataset (voices from the Perceptual Voice Quality Database) (PVQD model), and (2) the AI model trained on a low-quality high-quantity dataset (voices from the Mozilla Common Voice database) (Mozilla model). Ambiguity scores were calculated as the absolute value of the difference between the rating and certainty (0 or 100%). Both expert and naïve listeners achieved 100% accuracy in identifying voice gender based on a binary classification (female >50% voice femininity [R]). In comparison, the Mozilla-trained model achieved 92% accuracy and the previously published PVQD model achieved 84% accuracy in determining voice gender (female >50% AI voice femininity). While both AI models correlated with human ratings, the Mozilla-trained model showed a stronger correlation as well as lower overall rating ambiguity than the PVQD-trained model. The Mozilla model also appeared to handle pitch information in a similar way to human raters. The AI model predicted voice gender with high accuracy when compared to human listeners and has potential as a useful outcome measure for transgender individuals receiving gender-affirming voice training. The Mozilla-trained model performed better than the PVQD-trained model, indicating that for binary classification tasks, the quantity of data may influence accuracy more than the quality of the data used for training the voice AI models.

Vocal Characteristics across English-Northern Sotho Bilingual Speakers: A Comparative Study

Introduction: Bilinguals constitute a significant portion of speech-language pathologists’ (SLPs) caseloads. Insight into the cross-linguistic effect on voice is needed to guide SLPs to make linguistically appropriate observations when working with heterogenous populations. Method: Nineteen female English-Northern Sotho bilinguals performed three speech tasks (reading, picture description, and monologue) in each language. Acoustic analysis of mean fundamental frequency (f₀), intensity, and articulation rate was conducted with Praat. A panel of blinded listeners reached consensus after independently reviewing the recordings during perceptual analysis of voice quality, resonance, and glottal attack. Results: The following statistically significant differences were found across and within the languages: The mean f₀ was 204.61 Hz in the Northern Sotho picture description yet 196.50 Hz in the English picture description. The mean intensity of reading in Northern Sotho was 66.38 dB whereas the mean intensity of reading in English was 65.09 dB. Articulation rate was 3.78 syllables/s in English passage reading and 3.41 syllables/s in Northern Sotho passage reading. Within English, passage reading elicited a significantly quicker articulation rate than the picture description (3.34 syllables/s) and monologue (3.46 syllables/s). Within Northern Sotho, mean f₀ was 203.83 Hz in passage reading yet 191.11 Hz in the monologue. Perceptual voice quality, glottal attack, and resonance were comparable across languages. Conclusion: Relationships between languages spoken, task performance, and vocal characteristics were observed in English-Northern Sotho bilingual females. SLPs must consider the interaction of language, task performance, and vocal characteristics when working with bilingual clients.

Interaction of Voice Onset Time with Vocal Hyperfunction and Voice Quality

The main aim of the present work was to investigate whether vocal hyperfunction (VH), perceptual voice quality (VQ), gender, and phonetic environment influence Voice Onset Time (VOT). The investigated group consisted of 30 adults, including 19 women (X = 46.1 ± 13.7 years) and 11 men (X = 47.5 ± 11.0 years), who had either phonotraumatic vocal hyperfunction (PVH) and non-phonotraumatic vocal hyperfunction (NPVH). VQ was judged considering the overall severity of dysphonia (OS) and the subcharacteristics of roughness, breathiness, and strain. Phonetic variables such as vowel stress, syllable stress, and mode of speech task were analyzed. Four samples of syllables with [p] plus vowel or diphthong were retrieved from CAPE-V sentences recordings. Acoustic analysis with Praat comprised VOT, mean fundamental frequency (fo), intensity (SPL dB(A)), and coefficient of variation of fundamental frequency (CV_fo %). VOT was significantly influenced by OS (p ≤ 0.001) but not by vocal VH condition (PVH versus NPVH) (p = 0.90). However, CV_fo was affected by the VH condition (p = 0.02). Gender effects were only found for mean fo (p ≤ 0.001) and SPL (p = 0.01). All VQ sub characteristics (OS, roughness, breathiness, and strain) correlated with VOT (p ≤ 0.001) and SPL (p ≤ 0.001) but not with fo. In summary, VOT was affected by voice quality, while it was not affected by vocal hyperfunction conditions. Therefore, VOT has the potential to objectively describe the onset of voicing in voice diagnostics, and may be one underlying objective characteristic of perceptual vocal quality.

Advances in Clinical Voice Quality Analysis with VOXplot.

The assessment of voice quality can be evaluated perceptually with standard clinical practice, also including acoustic evaluation of digital voice recordings to validate and further interpret perceptual judgments. The goal of the present study was to determine the strongest acoustic voice quality parameters for perceived hoarseness and breathiness when analyzing the sustained vowel [a:] using a new clinical acoustic tool, the VOXplot software. A total of 218 voice samples of individuals with and without voice disorders were applied to perceptual and acoustic analyses. Overall, 13 single acoustic parameters were included to determine validity aspects in relation to perceptions of hoarseness and breathiness. Four single acoustic measures could be clearly associated with perceptions of hoarseness or breathiness. For hoarseness, the harmonics-to-noise ratio (HNR) and pitch perturbation quotient with a smoothing factor of five periods (PPQ5), and, for breathiness, the smoothed cepstral peak prominence (CPPS) and the glottal-to-noise excitation ratio (GNE) were shown to be highly valid, with a significant difference being demonstrated for each of the other perceptual voice quality aspects. Two acoustic measures, the HNR and the PPQ5, were both strongly associated with perceptions of hoarseness and were able to discriminate hoarseness from breathiness with good confidence. Two other acoustic measures, the CPPS and the GNE, were both strongly associated with perceptions of breathiness and were able to discriminate breathiness from hoarseness with good confidence.

A Machine-Learning Algorithm for the Automated Perceptual Evaluation of Dysphonia Severity

Auditory-perceptual assessments are the gold standard for assessing voice quality. This project aims to develop a machine-learning model for measuring perceptual dysphonia severity of audio samples consistent with assessments by expert raters. The Perceptual Voice Qualities Database samples were used, including sustained vowel and Consensus Auditory-Perceptual Evaluation of Voice sentences, whichwere previously expertly rated on a 0-100 scale. The OpenSMILE (audEERING GmbH, Gilching, Germany) toolkit was used to extract acoustic (Mel-Frequency Cepstral Coefficient-based, n=1428) and prosodic (n=152) features, pitch onsets, and recording duration. We utilized a support vector machineand these features (n=1582) for automated assessment of dysphonia severity. Recordings were separated into vowels (V) and sentences (S) and features were extracted separately from each. Final voice quality predictions were made by combining the features extracted from the individual components with the whole audio (WA) sample (three file sets: S, V, WA). This algorithm has a high correlation (r=0.847) with estimates of expert raters. The root mean square error was 13.36. Increasing signal complexity resulted in better estimation of dysphonia, whereby combining the features outperformed WA, S, and V sets individually. A novel machine-learning algorithm was able to perform perceptual estimates of dysphonia severity using standardized audio samples on a 100-point scale. This was highly correlated to expert raters. This suggests that ML algorithms could offer an objective method for evaluating voice samples for dysphonia severity.

Perceptual and Computational Estimates of Vocal Breathiness and Roughness in Sustained Phonation and Connected Speech

Clinical assessment of voice quality (VQ) often uses a combination of sustained phonations and more prolonged and more complex vocalizations. The purpose of this study was to compare the perceived vocal breathiness and vocal roughness of sustained phonations and connected speech over a wide range of dysphonia severity and to evaluate their relationship with acoustic measures and bioinspired models of breathiness and roughness. VQ dimension-specific single-variable matching task (SVMT) was used to index the perceived breathiness or roughness of five male and five female talkers on the basis of a sustained /a/ phonation and the 5th CAPE-V sentence. Acoustic measures of cepstral peak, autocorrelation peak and psychoacoustic measures of pitch strength, and temporal envelope standard deviation (EnvSD) was used to predict perceived breathiness and roughness judgments obtained from 10 listeners, respectively. High intra- and inter-listener reliability was observed for sustained phonations and connected speech. Perceived breathiness and roughness of sustained vowels and sentences obtained using SVMT were highly correlated for most dysphonic voices. The pitch strength model of breathiness was able to capture larger amount of perceptual variance compared to cepstral peak in both vowels and sentences. Autocorrelation peak was strongly correlated to perceived roughness in sentences while EnvSD was strongly correlated to perceived roughness in vowels. Results provide evidence that perception of VQ via SVMT can be successfully extended to connected speech. Computational models of VQ can be easily adapted to connected speech. Such automated models of VQ perception are valuable due to their computational efficiency and their ability to accurately capture the non-linearities of the human auditory system.

The effects of different voice qualities on the perceived personality of a speaker

Although previous studies investigated various aspects of voice quality perception and personality attribution there are no studies, to our knowledge, which simultaneously examine and compare the perception of various voice qualities when produced by the same individual. This work investigates how laryngeal and supralaryngeal voice quality variations of a speaker affect listeners' perceived personality traits (and thus perceived charisma) of that same speaker. Six Canadian English speakers produced paragraphs varying the following voice qualities: modal, creaky, breathy (natural and artificial), (hyper-)nasalization, and smiling (natural and extreme). Listeners of a perception experiment were then tasked to rate 10 statements for each presented audio stimulus. Statements were selected corresponding to a sub-section of the Big 5 personality traits shown to be linked to charisma perception. Results show significantly more positive listener ratings (i.e., higher ratings compared to modal) with medium effects sizes for both smiling variants across all personality traits. In contrast, creaky was perceived significantly more negatively overall for all personality traits, with a medium effect size. Nasal and breathy still achieved statistically significant rating differences compared to the modal baseline. However, the overall effect pattern was more complex, and effect sizes were small or negligible. Additionally, we found consistent differences for some voice qualities when examining listener ratings comparing male vs. female speakers: for both creaky and smiling (but not for other voice qualities), female speakers were rated more negatively when producing creaky for some personality traits, whereas both smiling variants were consistently rated higher for females compared to males.

Developmental Changes in the Perception of Vocal Loudness and Voice Quality in 3- to 6-Year-Old Children.

The study's primary aim was to investigate developmental changes in the perception of vocal loudness and voice quality in children 3-6 years of age. A second aim was to evaluate a testing procedure-the intermodal preferential looking paradigm (IPLP)-for the study of voice perception in young children. Participants were categorized in two age groups: 3- to 4-year-olds and 5- to 6-year-olds. Children were tested remotely via a Zoom appointment and completed two perceptual tasks: (a) voice discrimination and (b) voice identification. Each task consisted of two tests: a vocal loudness test and a voice quality test. Children in the 5- to 6-year-old group were significantly more accurate than children in the 3- to 4-year-old group in discriminating and identifying differences between voices for both loudness and voice quality. The IPLP, used in the identification task, was found to successfully detect differences between the age groups for overall accuracy and for most of the sublevels of vocal loudness and voice quality. Results suggest that children's ability to discriminate and identify differences in vocal loudness and voice quality improves with age. Findings also support the use of the IPLP as a useful tool to study voice perception in young children.

Effects of laryngeal vibratory asymmetry on voice acoustics and perception

Laryngeal vibratory asymmetry is commonly observed in many talkers, but its acoustic and perceptual consequences remain poorly understood. This study evaluates the relationships among vibratory symmetry, acoustic measures, and voice quality perception. We first test how the degree of left-right asymmetry in thyroarytenoid (TA) muscle activation relates to changes in voice quality as quantified by cepstral peak prominence (CPP). Using an in vivo canine phonation model, we stimulated each of the left and right TA muscles in a graded manner. Left-right asymmetry in vocal fold vibration was visually assessed, and CPP was measured from stable phonation. Results show that CPP is the highest at conditions of symmetric vibration and significantly decreases with increasing levels of asymmetry. In the subsequent audio rating experiment, 89 listeners ranked the phonation samples based on the quality (from worst to best). Overall, listeners prefer voices with higher CPP over those with lower CPP and voices with symmetric vibration over those with asymmetries. Results further reveal that listeners do not distinguish voices that fall within certain degrees of asymmetry. The relation between neuromuscular asymmetry and phonatory sound quality identified in this study has implications for clinical evaluation of the voice. [Work supported by NIH.]

Correlating Perceptual Voice Quality in Adductor Spasmodic Dysphonia With Computer Vision Assessment of Glottal Geometry Dynamics.

This study examined the relationship between voice quality and glottal geometry dynamics in patients with adductor spasmodic dysphonia (ADSD). An objective computer vision and machine learning system was developed to extract glottal geometry dynamics from nasolaryngoscopic video recordings for 78 patients with ADSD. General regression models were used to examine the relationship between overall voice quality and 15 variables that capture glottal geometry dynamics derived from the computer vision system. Two experts in ADSD independently rated voice quality for two separate voice tasks for every patient, yielding four different voice quality rating models. All four of the regression models exhibited positive correlations with clinical assessments of voice quality (R 2s = .30-.34, Spearman rho = .55-.61, all with p < .001). Seven to 10 variables were included in each model. There was high overlap in the variables included between the four models, and the sign of the correlation with voice quality was consistent for each variable across all four regression models. We found specific glottal geometry dynamics that correspond to voice quality in ADSD.