Physical characteristics of vocal folds during speech under stress

Abstract

We focus on variations in the glottal source of speech production, which is essential for understanding the generation of speech under psychological stress. In this paper, a two-mass vocal fold model is fitted to estimate the stiffness parameters of vocal folds during speech, and the stiffness parameters are then analyzed in order to classify recorded samples into neutral and stressed speech. Mechanisms of vocal folds under stress are derived from the experimental results. We propose using a Muscle Tension Ratio (MTR) to identify speech under stress. Our results show that MTR is more effective than a conventional method of stress measurement.