Acoustic Voice Analysis by Means of the Hoarseness Diagram

Abstract

The hoarseness diagram (Michaelis, Fröhlich, & Strube, 1998a) has been proposed as a new approach to describe different acoustic properties of voices. To test its performance in the analysis of pathologically disturbed and normal voices five requirements are suggested that should be met by any acoustic voice-analysis protocol to be used in voice research and clinical practice. The hoarseness diagram is then tested with regard to these requirements. Individual voices are found to show a satisfactory localization in the diagram. Aspects of stationarity are discussed in the context of four case studies. The different cases illustrate that changes in the acoustic analysis results are observed if the voice-generation conditions change, whereas results are stationary if phonation conditions do not change. Different pathological voice groups defined on grounds of the specific phonation mechanism are found to map to specific regions of the hoarseness diagram, with differences between group locations being significant. All results can be interpreted without exceptions if the two hoarseness diagram coordinates are taken to reflect the vibrational irregularity of the voice-generation mechanisms on the one side and the degree of closure of the vibrating structures on the other side. The hoarseness diagram and its underlying algorithms are thus shown to constitute a useful approach to acoustic voice analysis in research and clinical practice. The tests themselves demonstrate several application possibilities, including the quantitative monitoring of individual voices.

Análise acústica de vozes infantis: contribuições do diagrama de desvio fonatório

“…Acoustic analysis employs computerbased techniques to measure the properties of the acoustic signal-whether from a vowel or connected speech-providing more objective information regarding the voice signal compared to the auditoryperceptual analysis, as it produces quantitative data in the voice assessment process [9][10][11][12][13] .…”

“…In view of this, some studies [8][9][10][11][12] have indicated that a voice assessment should use a combination of several acoustic measures of perturbation and noise, so that each individual utterance is quantified by a set of attributes.…”

“…Studies on the utilization of the PDD in voice evaluation 10,12,17 have shown that the diagram is effective in analyzing the regularity of the sound signal and the additive noise component, thus providing information on the characteristics of the voice production of healthy and dysphonic individuals.…”

Disfonias orgânicas por neoplasias: análise de diagramas de desvio fonatório

“…It was possible to verify that the totality of vocal samples from the partial laryngectomy group were distributed out of the normality quadrant. Authors point that altered voices are located out of the lower left quadrant, in which are located adapted voices 10,13,[20][21][22] . The statistical analysis revealed that there was no significant difference in the comparison of the distribution of both groups.…”

“…The diagram is based in four acoustic measures: three of them related to irregularity of the sound signal -jitter, shimmer and their correlation; the fourth one is related to the noise component, named glottal to noise excitation ratio -GNE [13][14][15] . The differential of this diagram is that it is able to assess very deviant voices, besides showing differences between dysphonic groups with different phonatory mechanisms and it allows monitoring of vocal quality 10,[13][14][15][16][17] . The GNE is the acoustic measure that calculates the noise produced by the oscillation of vocal chords.…”