Resonant Voice: Spectral and Nasendoscopic Analysis

Although resonant voice therapy is a widely used therapeutic approach, little is known about what characterizes resonant voice and how it is physiologically produced. The purpose of this study was to test the hypothesis that resonant voice is produced by narrowing the laryngeal vestibule and is characterized by first formant tuning and more ample harmonics. Videonasendoscopic recordings of the laryngeal vestibule were made during nonresonant and resonant productions of /i/ in six subjects. Spectrums of the two voice types were also obtained. Spectral analysis showed that first formant tuning was exhibited during resonant voice productions and that the degree of harmonic enhancement in the range of 2.0 to 3.5 kHz was related to voice quality: nonresonant voice had the least amount of energy in this range, whereas a resonant-relaxed voice had more energy, and a resonant-bright voice had the greatest amount of energy. Visual-perceptual judgments of the videoendoscopic data indicated that laryngeal vestibule constriction was not consistently associated with resonant voice production.