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Self-rated vocal complaints relationship to Vocal Tract Discomfort and Singers Voice Handicap Index in Iranian religious singers

  • Laryngology
  • Published:
European Archives of Oto-Rhino-Laryngology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Purpose

The religious singing is a popular group of professional voice users in Iran which is performed in a sadness form to persuade the audiences to cry and think to holy persons. This style has its own unique vocal demands and abuses. Therefore, the present study, for the first time, aimed to investigate the prevalence of self-reported vocal complaints, vocal discomfort symptoms, and its effects on the vocal-related life of the Iranian religious singers.

Methods

In a cross-sectional study, 62 religious singers (28 women, 34 men) completed Singers Voice Handicap Index (SVHI), Vocal Tract Discomfort (VTD), and also a non-standard self-rated vocal complaint question. Spearman correlation test was applied to analyze correlations. Furthermore, 39 non-singers (18 women, 21 men) as a control group participated in this study.

Results

The religious singer’s mean score of the SVHI test was 34.84 (SD = 24.89). According to the self-rated vocal complaint question, almost 80% of the participants reported mild to the severe vocal complaints that was significantly higher than control group which was about 10%. The self-rated complaints indicated a significant positive correlation with the SVHI and the VTD reported by singers (p ≤ 0.001). The mean scores of the VTD symptoms in singers were significantly greater than control group. There was also a significant positive correlation between the two VTD and SVHI tests (p ≤ 0.001).

Conclusion

Religious singers are at a great risk of developing voice problems. Therefore, their vocal demands and requirements need to be followed precisely. The SVHI and VTD tests should also be considered as two efficient tools for religious singers.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank religious singer club (Basijmaddahan) personnel for their cooperation in performing this research. In addition, we appreciate to Vice chancellor for research and technology of Hamadan University of Medical Sciences that financially supported this study with approved research number 9704262270.

Funding

This research was financially supported by Vice chancellor for research and technology of Hamadan University of Medical Sciences.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Speech and Language Pathology, Autism spectrum disorders Research center, Hamadan University of Medical Sciences, Mardom Park Street, P.O.Box: 6517838677, Hamadan, Iran

    Mohammad-Sadegh Seifpanahi & Mohammad Rezayi

  2. Department of Speech and Language Pathology, Ava Rehabilitation Center, Karaj, Iran

    Behnaz Bayat

  3. Department of Biostatistics, Hamadan University of Medical Sciences, Hamadan, Iran

    Somayeh Ghorbani Gholiabad

Authors
  1. Mohammad-Sadegh Seifpanahi
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  2. Behnaz Bayat
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  3. Somayeh Ghorbani Gholiabad
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  4. Mohammad Rezayi
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Contributions

All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by M-SS, BB, SGG, and MR. The first draft of the manuscript was written by M-SS, and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Mohammad-Sadegh Seifpanahi.

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The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants (including this study) were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional (Ethical committee of Hamadan University of Medical Sciences; Number: IR.UMSHA.REC.1397.229) and with the 1964 Declaration of Helsinki and its later amendments or comparable ethical Standards.

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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Seifpanahi, MS., Bayat, B., Ghorbani Gholiabad, S. et al. Self-rated vocal complaints relationship to Vocal Tract Discomfort and Singers Voice Handicap Index in Iranian religious singers. Eur Arch Otorhinolaryngol 278, 2411–2419 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00405-021-06741-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00405-021-06741-5

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