Combined effect of noise and room acoustics on vocal effort in simulated classrooms

Cipriano, Marcella; Astolfi, Arianna; Pelegrín-García, David

doi:10.1121/1.4973849

Cited by 32 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…This information is important because it can guide vocal health promotion actions helping to decrease the occurrence of voice disorders and improve speakers´voice-related quality of life. For instance, among occupational voice users, such as teachers and call center operators, considering their high risk of developing voice disorders associated with their working conditions (Pelegrín-García and Brunskog, 2012;Cantor-Cutiva et al, 2013;Bottalico et al, 2015;Bottalico et al, 2016a;Cantor-Cutiva and Burdorf, 2016;Bottalico et al, 2017a;Banks et al, 2017;Cipriano et al, 2017;Cantor-Cutiva et al, 2019;Carrillo-Gonzalez et al, 2019), it is determinant to identify specific elements that can help to improve "healthy" occupational voice use. Therefore, knowing that sidetone may help to decrease SPL and increase self-perceived voice comfort and control, speech and language pathologists at the workplaces may train occupational voice users using sidetone to strengthen voice comfort and control and reduce occupational voice misuse.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Vocal comfort can be defined as a subjective attribute that is directly correlated to the positive evaluation of the room for speech production and to the perceived support. Vocal comfort has been shown to be negatively correlated to the feeling of having to raise the voice and to the tiredness after speaking for a long time period in the room (Pelegrín-García et al, 2014;Cipriano et al, 2017). A questionnaire investigation showed that voice comfort is more closely related to the perceived noise annoyance than to the perceived room reverberance.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Changes of Voice Production in Artificial Acoustic Environments

Sierra-Polanco¹,

Cutiva²,

Hunter³

et al. 2021

Front. Built Environ.

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The physical production of speech level dynamic range is directly affected by the physiological features of the speaker such as vocal tract size and lung capacity; however, the regulation of these production systems is affected by the perception of the communication environment and auditory feedback. The current study examined the effects of room acoustics in an artificial setting on voice production in terms of sound pressure level and the relationship with the perceived vocal comfort and vocal control. Three independent room acoustic parameters were considered: gain (alteration of the sidetone or playback of one’s own voice), reverberation time, and background noise. An increase in the sidetone led to a decrease in vocal sound pressure levels, thus increasing vocal comfort and vocal control. This effect was consistent in the different reverberation times considered. Mid-range reverberation times (T30 ≈ 1.3 s) led to a decrease in vocal sound pressure level along with an increase in vocal comfort and vocal control, however, the effect of the reverberation time was smaller than the effect of the gain. The presence of noise amplified the aforementioned effects for the variables analyzed.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Changes of Voice Production in Artificial Acoustic Environments

Sierra-Polanco¹,

Cutiva²,

Hunter³

et al. 2021

Front. Built Environ.

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“…Various researchers have quoted various factors that can be associated with teacher's voice in a classroom. Some of these are working posture, teaching core subjects, classroom noise, voice ergonomic factors, presence or absence of sound amplification, teachers with voice problems, classroom capacity, gender, stress, speech style, room acoustics, vocal fatigue, acoustic environment, vocalisation time, reverberation and combined effect of noise and acoustics . These factors may act independently or may be linked to each other.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…21 presence or absence of sound amplification, 22 teachers with voice problems, 23 classroom capacity, 24 gender, 25 stress, 26 speech style, room acoustics, vocal fatigue, 27 acoustic environment, 28 vocalisation time, 29 reverberation 30 and combined effect of noise and acoustics. 31 These factors may act independently or may be linked to each other. A brief summary of these studies is given in Table 8.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Voice burden in teachers and non‐teachers in a UK population: A questionnaire‐based survey

Gadepalli

Fullwood

Ascott

et al. 2019

Clinical Otolaryngology

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Objective To characterise the burden of voice disorders in teachers in a UK population, compare it with non‐teachers and identify groups of teachers who may be particularly at risk of developing a voice problem. Design Questionnaire‐based survey of primary and secondary school teachers and non‐teachers. Questions consisted of general demographics, VHI‐10 and questions relating to voice problems. Methods Distribution of questionnaires to teachers and non‐teachers and statistical analysis of the responses. Setting University teaching hospital. Participants Teachers and non‐teachers in a region of North West England. Main outcome measures Identification of risk factors for voice problems in teachers, compared to non‐teachers. Results A total of 210 primary and 244 secondary school teachers and 304 non‐teachers participated in the questionnaire survey. Response rates were 67.9% from primary schools, 41.2% from secondary schools and 40.0% from the non‐teachers. 30.0% of teachers and 9.0% of non‐teachers had reported problems with their voice. 12.8% of teachers and 2.0% of non‐teachers had missed work due to voice problems. 14.1% of teachers and 5.3% non‐teachers had seen a general practitioner for voice‐related problems, whilst 7.1% of teachers and 6.3% of non‐teachers had been referred to an otolaryngologist or speech therapist for voice problems. Factors related to VHI‐10 (P < .05) were identified. Conclusions Voice disorders are an occupational health problem for teachers, with a significant burden of these disorders in this group of teachers in the UK. We have identified risk factors that could be exploited to identify groups of teachers who would benefit from early intervention.

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“…A review of literature suggests that most speech tasks used in experiments only capture a part of the changes in speech mechanism relevant to speech intelligibility such as speech sound pressure level 11 and other speech parameters due to the effect of reverberation and noise 12,55 or have been done in simulated environments. 56 With respect to classroom environments, it becomes important to study any differences observed in global speech characteristics and vowel articulation characteristics of talkers from real classroom environments, when exposed to different room acoustical conditions and when using the natural mode of speech delivery, that is, lecturing. In this study, natural modifications in speech in terms of correlates of speech intelligibility were studied within and across talkers, when eliciting a typical lecture mode of speech as against reading a passage and also under typical classroom noise, reflecting the circumstances associated with communicative demands typical of classroom discourse.…”

Section: Global Speech Characteristicsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effect of mode of delivery and background noise on speech characteristics of talkers in a classroom environment

Subramaniam

Ramamurthy

2019

Building Acoustics

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Global and acoustic–phonetic correlates of speech intelligibility are important measures of talker intelligibility. Speech characteristics have been evaluated using speech samples that involve reading pre-administered passages under controlled environments. In classrooms, lecturing is the mode of speech delivery. The presence of noise from ceiling fans and other external noise hinder the speech communication process. This study evaluated the talkers’ speech characteristics utilizing recordings from graduate students under reading and lecturing modes and in the presence and absence of noise generated by ceiling fans. The acoustical conditions under which talkers delivered their speech were characterized using octave band U50 values. Global and acoustic–phonetic correlates of talker intelligibility were measured and the variation in correlates of speech intelligibility was statistically analyzed. The results revealed that talkers significantly modified their speech characteristics relevant to intelligibility across modes of speech delivery and in the presence of noise. Fundamental frequency measures such as F0-mean and F0-SD and durational measures such as speech and pause rates were all found to be higher for lecture mode of delivery. Talkers showed similar vowel-articulatory changes under the two modes of delivery. When lecturing in the presence of noise, talkers significantly reduced the length of pauses and also utilized a combination of vowel-articulatory strategies to overcome the presence of noise. The results suggest the need to investigate talkers’ speech adaptation in real classroom environments in terms of correlates of speech intelligibility and to reconsider classroom acoustical guidelines in view of both listener and talker intelligibilities.

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Combined effect of noise and room acoustics on vocal effort in simulated classrooms

Cited by 32 publications

References 11 publications

Changes of Voice Production in Artificial Acoustic Environments

Changes of Voice Production in Artificial Acoustic Environments

Voice burden in teachers and non‐teachers in a UK population: A questionnaire‐based survey

Effect of mode of delivery and background noise on speech characteristics of talkers in a classroom environment

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