Variability Analysis of Fo Parameter in the Voice of Individuals with Hearing Disturbances

Abstract

The material of this investigation comprised a group of 18 patients with deep hypoacousis (over 70 dB) or complete deafness which, depending on the onset of the deafness, was divided into the 3 categories: congenital, early childhood to 3rd year of life, and postlingual. All of them underwent ENT, phoniatric and stroboscopy examinations; in 10, X-ray tomography of the larynx was also performed. The status of hearing ability was assessed by audiometric examinations using pure tones in air and bone conductions. The acoustic examinations comprising spectrographic and tonographic analyses were performed on an appropriate linguistic material including vowels, isolated words, sentences and reading text. The measurement of Fo was performed on isolated vowels. In order to characterise the degree and kind of periodicity disturbances the following parameters were estimated: the medium value of fundamental frequency, the range of Fo variability, the maximal change of period length from cycle to cycle, and its medium value (jitter). The results of the acoustic examinations revealed different degrees and kinds of periodicity disturbances depending on the depth of the hypoacousis and its onset.

Normal-like Motor Speech Parameters Measured in Children With Long-term Cochlear Implant Experience Using a Novel Objective Analytic Technique

“…The homogeneity in our group meant that we could not meaningfully identify covariates that might explain our MSP results. fundamental frequency, 6,7 and abnormal intonation 6,7 when compared with normal-hearing peers. Using a standard method of voice assessment (MDVP), we found that children who are profoundly deaf awaiting cochlear implantation had abnormally poor frequency and amplitude control with sustained phonation compared with children with normal hearing.…”

“…1 Later in life, this same feedback modulates voice and speech production via continuous fine adjustments to voice and speech. 2,3 By contrast, children who are deaf demonstrate abnormal voice and speech production; specifically, they have less pitch variation, 4 less variation in fundamental frequency, 5 more period-to-period variation in fundamental frequency, 6,7 and abnormalities with intonation 6,7 as compared with normal-hearing peers. A study using a standard method of voice assessment (multidimensional voice program [MDVP]) found that children with profound deafness awaiting cochlear implantation had poor frequency and amplitude control during sustained vowel phonation as compared with normal-hearing peers.…”

Speech Intelligibility Measurements in Tinnitus Patients with and without Hearing Loss

“…The Digit Triplet Test is composed of four statistically balanced lists. Each of them contains 25 different digit triplets [7,9]. The digit triplet is a complex of three digits (for example 2-4-7, pronounced separately as two--four-seven).…”

“…A further division of the tests is related to the type of linguistic material used in the test. There are sentence tests [1][2][3][4][5], word tests [6][7][8] or digital and numerical tests [9][10][11][12][13] used to measure speech intelligibility. According to diagnostic possibilities the tests can be divided into screening tests used for preliminary evaluation of speech intelligibility and tests of clinical applications for detailed diagnostics of the auditory system.…”

Voice field measurements—a new method of examination: the influence of hearing on the human voice

“…3,4,6,7 The difficulties in keeping proper vocal cord tension can explain the unsteadiness of basic voice and its sudden changesskipping. 8,9 Vocal cord hypertension, the increase of subglottic pressure, and extralaryngeal hypertension lead to an increase of basic voice frequency level. 1,5,[10][11][12] The voice of such people is higher, unsteady, and made with greater effort.…”