The viscoelastic properties of the human and canine pharyngeal tissue in te
nsion were evaluated, based on both an experimental protocol-consisting of
cyclic load, tensile stress relaxation, and incremental step load tests-and
the quasi-linear viscoelastic theory, The reduced stress relaxation functi
on and the elastic response of the pharyngeal tissues were derived from the
experimental results specifically obtained from those tissues. The charact
eristic features of viscoelastic property were obtained for both human and
canine pharyngeal tissues by applying the quasi-linear viscoelastic theory
and compared with each other. The material properties of the pharyngeal tis
sue were sought to facilitate the three-dimensional biomechanical model of
the pharyngeal function by using the finite element method.