THE EFFECT OF WEARING A MASK ON VOICE ACOUSTICS
1SBÜ İstanbul Gaziosmanpaşa EAH, Dil ve Konuşma Terapisi, İstanbul, Türkiye2SBÜ İstanbul Gaziosmapaşa EAH, Kulak Burun Boğaz, İstanbul, Türkiye
3Karabük Üniversitesi, Odyoloji, Karabük, Türkiye Objective: This study aims to investigate the effect of mask use on acoustic parameters of voıce.
Materials and Methods: The study included 60 participants (30 female and 30 male) aged 18-65 years, with a healthy voice, non-smoker, non-covid, and did not receive any previous diagnosis and treatment for voice disorders. A 5-second /a/ vocal from these participants in a quiet room (<30 dB background noise) without the mask and with various masks (N90, N95) was recorded with Audacity software. Voice recordings were analyzed with Praat software.
Results: The mean age of the individuals included in the study was 34.53±11.61 (18-60). There was no significant difference in F0, shimmer and NHR in the voice analysis performed without the mask, with the N90 mask on and the N95 mask on (p>0.05). However, the jitter value was lower in the analysis performed with the N90 mask on compared to the analysis performed without the mask and with the N95 mask on (p<0.05).
Conclusion: Our study, determined that wearing a mask affects the acoustic parameters of the voice. For this reason, acoustic evaluations of the voice should be made without a mask.
Keywords : Jitter, voce, acoustic, mask, shimmer