Aging Voice in Cantonese-Speaking Older Adults: Laryngeal Structural Status, Self-Reported Voice Issues, and Voice...

This study examined whether Cantonese-speaking older adults differing in presbylarynx status and self-reported voice issues showed differences in perceptual, instrumental, and self-reported voice characteristics.

A total of 107 older adults were classified by presbylarynx status and self-reported voice issues. Fifteen voice outcomes spanning auditory-perceptual voice severity, cepstral, noise, perturbation, fundamental frequency, and intensity-related measures, maximum phonation time, vocal effort, and aging voice-related impact were examined. Data were analyzed using 2 × 2 factorial general linear models with age and sex as covariates. Partial eta-squared (η²p) effect sizes and Benjamini-Hochberg false discovery rate (FDR)-adjusted P-values were computed for the primary model terms.

At the unadjusted level, main effects of presbylarynx status were found for sustained-vowel CPP (P = 0.040, η²p = 0.041) and OMNI-VES (P = 0.026, η²p = 0.048), and a presbylarynx status × self-reported voice issues interaction was found for OMNI-VES (P = 0.042, η²p = 0.040). Sustained-vowel CPP was higher in speakers without presbylarynx than in those with presbylarynx, and the highest vocal effort was observed in speakers with both presbylarynx and self-reported voice issues. No main effect of self-reported voice issues was found for any measure. All effects were small (η²p ≤ 0.05), and none remained significant after Benjamini-Hochberg FDR correction for multiple comparisons.

These findings suggest limited alignment between laryngeal structural status, measured voice characteristics, and self-reported voice experience in older adults. Although the associations were small and did not remain significant after correction for multiple comparisons, the pattern for perceived vocal effort warrants further study as a possible indicator of functional burden when presbylarynx co-occurs with self-reported voice issues.