Effects of utterance length and vocal loudness on speech breathing in older adults

Abstract

Age-related reductions in pulmonary elastic recoil and respiratory muscle strength can affect how older adults generate subglottal pressure required for speech production. The present study examined age-related changes in speech breathing by manipulating utterance length and loudness during a connected speech task (monologue). Twenty-three older adults and twenty-eight young adults produced a monologue at comfortable loudness and pitch and with multi-talker babble noise playing in the room to elicit louder speech. Dependent variables included sound pressure level, speech rate, and lung volume initiation, termination, and excursion. Older adults produced shorter utterances than young adults overall. Age-related effects were larger for longer utterances. Older adults demonstrated very different lung volume adjustments for loud speech than young adults. These results suggest that older adults have a more difficult time when the speech system is being taxed by both utterance length and loudness. The data were consistent with the hypothesis that both young and older adults use utterance length in premotor speech planning processes.

Medidas da dinâmica respiratória em idosos participantes de grupos de terceira idade

“…Os achados relacionados à fonação de indiví-duos em processo de envelhecimento mostram a redução do fluxo aéreo e a diminuição do tempo máximo de fonação (TMF), podendo resultar num menor suporte respiratório, com diminuição da pressão aérea subglótica e da intensidade vocal 6,[11][12][13][14][15][16][17] . Mostram também que a diminuição do TMF no idoso pode acarretar uma incoordenação pneumofonoarticulatória e um conseqüente aumento na velocidade de fala 17 .…”

Respiratory physiology during reading aloud tasks

“…These findings were in agreement with previous research. The breathing mechanism is only significantly responsive to the complexity of the reading tasks in concerning to RCE 15,16 and LVE 17,19,20 . This means that as the demanding levels and the lengths of the phonatory tasks increase, the chest wall kinematics system is able to anticipate them and respond appropriately to support their aerodynamic demands, regarding the amount of volume necessary to produce a spoken sample 15,16,19,20 .…”

“…piratory behavior 15,16,17,18,19,20,21 . Inspiratory and expiratory muscular forces were higher for longer sentences than for shorter ones.…”

“…Inspiratory and expiratory muscular forces were higher for longer sentences than for shorter ones. As the demanding levels and lengths of the phonatory tasks increase, LVE, rib cage excursion (RCE) and abdomen excursion (ABE) increased, too 15,16,17,20,21 . On the other hand, during sentence production the correlation between ABE and duration was less evident 15 .…”

Distúrbios fonoaudiológicos autodeclarados e fatores associados em idosos

“…The fluidity of the communication process undergoes major changes after hearing loss -even after a mild degree hearing loss 8 . Just like speech changes, the elderly may report vocal quality-related complaints, such as hoarseness, whispery voice, decreased volume and flexibility, trembling voice and decreased clarity 3 , which may occur due to histological changes to the vocal tract structures 14 and to the decreased vibration abilities of vocal folds [15][16][17] , thus requiring an increased effort to sustain their vibration 18 .…”