Objective assessment of vocal fatigue in laboratory and real-world settings - PROJECT SUMMARY: Approximately 30% of US adults are affected by a voice disorder during their lives, with about 25 million people experiencing a voice disorder at any given point in time, resulting in societal costs (lost work, medical expenses, etc.) estimated at $13.5 billion annually. Vocal fatigue is viewed as an etiological and/or reactive component in most common voice disorders and is also among the most common voice-related complaints of individuals who rely on their voices to make a living (e.g., teachers, singers, etc.). The objective of the proposed study is to quantify the impact of vocal fatigue on phonatory function and to identify the vocal behaviors (voicing and resting) that are associated with the progression of vocal fatigue and its recovery in vocally typical/healthy participants. This objective will be accomplished using a combination of multimodal measurement of the phonatory system (high-speed imaging, aerodynamics, electroglottography, acoustics, and neck-surface vibration, speech breathing, and autonomic nervous system) during a well-controlled vocal loading protocol in a laboratory setting and during ambulatory voice monitoring in ecological, real-world settings. The study will use advanced machine learning techniques to create a multi-modal representation of the progression of vocal fatigue and its recovery. It is hypothesized that differences in phonatory function, phonatory behavior, and resting behavior will account for the observed high variability in the recovery times among different individuals. This R00 application has two specific aims. Aim 1: Develop a multimodal representation that more accurately predicts changes in vocal function associated with vocal loading. Aim 2: Identify vocal loading and post-loading vocal function/behavior that predict vocal recovery time. The results of this work are expected to provide new objective information about the impact of vocal fatigue on phonatory function and the vocal behaviors associated with vocal fatigue and recovery. The long term goal of this study is to develop new clinical tools for the assessment and management of vocal fatigue in individuals with voice disorders and normophonic, as well as setting proactive safe limits for daily voice use based on quantitative measures of vocal function/behavior.
