Silence and Voicing Accumulations in Italian Primary School Teachers With and Without Voice Disorders.
Pasquale Bottalico, Simone Graetzer, Arianna Astolfi and 1 others
PMID 27316793WHAT IT FOUND
Teachers with organic voice disorders voiced more of their workday, especially in 0.17 to 3.15 second stretches, and had less silence in 3.16 to 10 second pauses.
The study did not test whether changing these patterns improves voice.
Key findings
01Teachers with organic voice disorders had the highest overall voicing time, at 40.2% of monitored time, compared with 31.9% for teachers with mild organic alteration or functional symptoms and 32.3% for teachers with normal voice.
02Teachers with organic voice disorders showed more voicing in stretches from 0.17 to 3.15 seconds.
03Teachers with organic voice disorders had more silence in most shorter and middle time ranges, but less silence in the 3.16 to 10 second range.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
Only 26 teachers were studied, and only 4 had organic voice disorders. Participation was voluntary, and the clinical grouping happened after monitoring. The study measured silence and voicing during workdays, not recovery from vocal fatigue. No hearing tests were performed, although teachers reported hearing status. All teachers were Italian primary school teachers with 20 to 30 pupils, so the results may not apply to other voice users or teaching settings.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read the lower long silence as proof that longer breaks would prevent or treat voice disorders. This was an observational study of 26 teachers, with only 4 in the organic disorder group, and it did not test whether changing voicing or silence improves voice.