H. Hollien et al., LONGITUDINAL RESEARCH ON ADOLESCENT VOICE CHANGE IN MALES, The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 96(5), 1994, pp. 2646-2654
Many of the characteristics and processes associated with adolescence
are reasonably well understood; others are not. Still unanswered are q
uestions about adolescent voice change. For example, when does the ave
rage child start the process; what changes result and what is their ex
tent; when is it complete? Further, how closely do shifts in vocal lev
el parallel, or even predict, the adolescent process? This project was
carried out in order to obtain data which would complement available
information on the subject and provide additional specificity about vo
ice change and pubescence-at least for boys. To that end, a longitudin
al study was conducted in which 48 males were tracked over a 5-year pe
riod. Voice measurements were made-including speaking fundamental freq
uency (SFF) and phonational frequency range (PFR)-as were others relat
ing to physical size (height, weight, and six body dimensions). It was
found that (1) stable adolescent voice change (AVC) measurements coul
d be obtained, (2) maturation patterns appeared predictable on the bas
is of AVC changes, and (3) both the onset and duration of voice change
extended over a longer period of time than had been previously though
t.