The effect of task on determination of habitual loudness

The purpose of this study was to investigate if there is an effect of task on determination of habitual loudness. Four tasks commonly used to elicit habitual loudness were compared (automatic speech, elicited speech, spontaneous speech, and reading aloud). Participants were adult female speakers (N = 30) with normal voice. A one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) revealed a statistically significant (p < 0.05) effect of task, with post-hoc analyses indicating that there was a statistically significant difference in habitual loudness elicited via automatic versus spontaneous speech (p < 0.05), and automatic speech versus reading aloud (p < 0.001). The issue of how habitual loudness is defined is considered. Implications of the use of one task for determination of habitual loudness are discussed, as is the possibility of a task effect on determination of other clinically useful vocal parameters.