We return! To discuss the effects of trauma on the voice. An unexpected detour this month, since so many papers have been written on it and yours truly has had a troubled relationship with the voice during times of troubled relationships. A podcaster’s nightmare.
And also. A singer’s nightmare.
Today, we cover the paper:
What’s in a singer’s voice: The effect of attachment, emotions and trauma
Elisa Monti, David C. Kidd, Linda M. Carroll & Emanuele Castano
Logopedics Phoniatrics Vocology
2016
The field of vocology and vocal care isn’t a stranger to ways psychology can upset the voice. Divorces, personal losses, natural disasters… Distress in life comes through in the way we express ourselves. When duress is great enough, we might even fall mute – unable to utter – without a single, clear, physiological cause. This makes it challenging, of course, as is always the case, for anyone afflicted to get effective care. A holistic, system-thinking, approach is necessary to pinpoint the mental hangup causing vocal disorder…. Which isn’t what western medicine deals with. It can leave vocal professionals – such as singers or podcasters – shit out of luck, in further distress, and at risk of losing career traction.
Emotional states have been implicated in vocalization challenges and changes. Anger makes the voice punchy. Sweetness and care are associated with slow and agile mouth movements. Let down is expressed with gradual softening. And “As vocal psychotherapist Diane Austin observes, if one’s needs and feelings remain unmet, the voice can become inaudible, tense, breathy, or simply ‘untrue.’” One might say it becomes “inauthentic.”
So, while feelings unquestionable affect voice… we have to wonder if there’s a traceable pathway from one to the next. Is physiology affected by psychology, which then changes vocal output?
This would be highly applicable and potentially beneficial to study in professional vocalizers – singers – whose identity and often livelihood is linked to vocal control and capacity, as their awareness of voice is internally heightened and externally mediated. Therefore, the authors of this paper conducted two studies using singers. First, asking how attachment and voice are related. Secondly, looking at psychological characteristics of those attachment styles as they affect voice (i.e. shame and guilt).
Let’s talk background information on attachment, trauma, shame, and physiology.
Attachment
Attachment style begins in infancy, as the relationship with parents establishes the relational expectations of the individual. Parental figures are supposed to offer protection and security – a barrier from stress and fear – that teaches the child how safe relationships function. Attachment is thought to be shaped by 1) proximity of the caregiver to the child 2) need fulfillment from the parent to the child and 3) sense of safety provided by the adult to the kiddo.
Psychology commonly focuses on three forms of attachment; Secure, insecure anxious, and insecure avoidant. Secure attachment corresponds with a child’s ability to function separately while realizing they can return to the parent when needed. Anxious attachment is marked by duress when the adult is not in proximity and continued discomfort when they are around. Avoidant attachment is linked with disinterest in the caregiver when proximal. And surprise category four: disorganized attachment can feature a combination of the above. These patterns are established young and often carried through life.
They not only affect how adults feel about others – but also themselves. If gifted secure attachment, resilience and relational responsiveness are often seen. If insecure attachment is built, sense of incompetence and relational unreliability are more common. These are generally stable attachment and self-assessment patterns because they’re recreated from childhood into the grown individual, consistently confirming previously established beliefs about whether the person is worthy or valuable.
We discuss attachment because it doesn’t exist in a vacuum:
Attachment and physiology
Insecure attachment, in general, might have destructive health effects. Because it corresponds with sensing a lack of safety in relationship and in isolation, it can increase chronic stress load. Stress load can then impact all biological systems. Insecure attachment is known to impact the brain, heart, and skin.
In particular, insecure anxious attachment is not correlated with positive personal health outcomes. But insecure avoidant attachment doesn’t seem to feature the same critically negative results, suggesting that anxious attachment may interplay with physiology in a deleterious manner.
With all of these long-term health effects connected to attachment style, it’s unlikely that the voice isn’t affected as well. And since both forms of insecure attachment herald back to childhood relationships, we also need to talk about:
Childhood trauma and physiology
You’ve heard – the body keeps the score. Physiology isn’t immune to negative effects of trauma, and the longer the duration, the greater the change. Our bodies can be thrown off systemically, leading to things like chronic inflammation and immune disorder that open the door to myriad illnesses and ailments. Trauma also changes the structures of the brain, impacting the functionality of the entire meat suit. High ACE scores are correlated with disease and early fatality for a reason.
The relationship between attachment and vocalization, however, hadn’t been explored prior to this study.
What had been previously revealed through research was the impact of trauma on respiration, which can be severe enough to cause vocal impairment without physiological pathology – even to extreme lengths such as aphonia (loss of capacity to speak). Major psychological events like losses and accidents can cause these constrictive disorders without a clear biological source.
When we’re talking about constriction and self-shutdown? It’s also a good idea to discuss:
Anxiety and Shame
It’s no mystery: anxiety affects the body. It can lead to changes in breathing, which changes the voice. Research suggests that higher anxiety levels could correspond with greater voice pathology, higher frequency range, and reduction in silent (intentional) pauses.
A bit on silent pauses: they’re used to determine next words without using fillers (um, like, ya know), and they’re also instrumental in allowing the listener to absorb, calibrate, and respond. After a sentence or question, we might use a silent pause to open room for the other voice to chime in. During a sentence, we might use one to carefully choose what direction we’ll continue our speech in. When we’re anxious, the mind doesn’t allow for this quiet, calm, collected feature of speech. Instead, language is more rushed, jumbled, and impulsively expressed.
Shame may also play a role in voice, making it smaller and less exposing. Vocalizing draws attention, so self-conscious feelings can cause obstacles to expressing oneself or doing it confidently. In the case of singers, stage fright is a sizable challenge when humiliation or self-unworthiness are feared. That means shame, like anxiety, is another potential connection between childhood trauma, wonky attachment, and voice pathology.
And, luckily, we have voice professionals to learn from:
More evidence from performance and implications for singers
Because singers centralize identity around voice, it is heavily psychologically impacted. Traumatic events are known to impact performances. Conflict and family health are particularly implicated in spawning anxiety and affecting vocalization.
This is unique to singers, whereas other performers might be able to separate mental and emotional conditions from their ability to play another instrument. Because in the case of vocalists the body contains the software and hardware necessary to do the job, they have no separation point between mind and output. The nerves controlling the throat, lungs, and vocal cords can’t be tuned up separate from changing the emotional or nervous system state of the performer. Spasms, constriction, and relaxation of the laryngeal muscles are correlated with systemic wellness or distress.
Again, we can nod easily towards stage fright as an example of the brain-body-voice connection, during which the heart and throat are often acutely affected. This connection is so weighty that researchers such as McGinnis and Milling have posited that stage fright and social anxiety are remarkably similar; once again potentially implicating insecure attachment as a cause of negative vocal health.
So how did researchers explore these connections?
METHODS
Thirty-five adult participants identifying as singers were recruited for the study. Attachment style was assessed using the ECR-R (Experiences in Close Relationships–Revised). The Childhood Trauma Questionnaire Short Form was administered to assess trauma. A revised version of the State–Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) was utilized to score anxiousness. The TOSCA-3 (Test of Self-Conscious Affect version 3) was used to assess shame proneness (47). They used The Singing Voice Handicap Index to record voice disability in singing. And once again the voice analysis was conducted using LingWAVES (49), a software program used for professional voice and speech analysis.
Participants first completed the questionnaires on the internet and later had their singing voices recorded in-person. Researchers later analyzed the results of both.
Discussion
In study one attachment style and voice were examined. Anxious attachment diminished the intensity of the singers’ voices, while contributing to greater jitter and irregularity. However, avoidant attachment was also shown to increase jitter and shimmer (variation in pitch and volume).
It seems that both insecure attachment styles may impact singing – but the question remains… what mediates these changes?
In study two this was examined. Somewhat unsurprisingly, shame is the answer! It explains how unstable attachment can suppress or damage a voice. The authors suggest that a destructive self-image may correlate with keeping oneself protectively hidden – something that an intense voice would not permit. So, the voice becomes diminished due to the psychology of the subject.
Interestingly, this result didn’t carry through with guilt. Guilt reflects an action or behavior that one feels negatively about. Shame indicates that the personality or personhood of the individual is the source of negative emotion. In which case, it makes sense that shame negatively controls the voice while guilt isn’t implicated in the same way.
And what about anxiety?
Of interest, while shame mediated the impact of anxious attachment on intensity, anxiety (which is not associated particularly with ‘feeling small’) was not a reliable mediator.
They’re saying anxiety doesn’t necessarily make use withdraw into ourselves the way that shame does. So, it doesn’t affect the voice in the same quieting way.
But childhood emotional neglect might.
Childhood emotional neglect affected overall and peak voice intensity. Potentially because it correlates with withdrawal and preference for an unstimulated nervous system; methods of coping with emotional dysregulation in the absence of healthy emotional support or need fulfillment. The authors note this is unsurprising when considering the connection between emotional neglect, social isolation, self-diminishment, and lack of learned emotional regulation tools. With no options for treating unpleasant emotional conditions, individuals try to hide themselves as a form of protection against acquiring any, instead.
This conditioned instinct to self-camouflage rather than standing out may underlie diminished voice intensity and utility in singers.
And, potentially, the rest of us.
GENERAL DISCUSSION / WRAP
Study one showed a correlation between insecure attachment and diminished vocal intensity, as well as unwanted variations in pitch and volume. Study two replicated the relationship between anxious attachment and intensity while revealing that shame was the mediating factor between the two. And lastly, emotional neglect – moreso than abuse – was found to degrade vocal intensity – an indicator of contractive behavior for withdrawal-based self-protection, rather than confidently showcasing oneself.
All in all, results could suggest that sense of self is affected by trauma, which affects the voice – the tool used to proclaim ourselves as persons. Because singers can’t separate the two (self-identity and voice), the effect of trauma on vocal physiology is especially pronounced in their lives. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t affect the rest of us.
While physiological damage might be the go-to for vocal disorders, this study suggests that emotional disruption or dysregulation, low self-regard, and low sense of personal safety (alone and with others) might be the culprits behind voice pathology.
And isn’t that some shit?
Struggling to express yourself? You might want to take a look at the relationships that formed your sense of self. Improving self-esteem and relational expectations while working on need fulfillment might be the best remedies for a worn out voice. Staying silent to give it rest? Might actually be reinforcing the survival strategy of keeping small, quiet, and unassuming.
Build better relationships, foster a safe environment, and work on improving those emotional regulation skills, and perhaps you’ll be singing or speaking – professionally or for your own pleasure – with intensive and authentic abandon, soon, again.
And with that…
Don’t dismiss how emotions affect everything.
Learn about your attachment style for ways it could be reducing your living capacity.
And heed signals coming from your physiology as potential indicators of your psychological state. If you can’t speak or sound like yourself… that self might be in a reduced state and need some re-acceptance before you’re belting your heart out again.
Til we speak again next time?
Hail yourself.
And it’s effects on your voice.
Thanks for being here, sharing both.
Don’t stop humming along.
And I’ll talk to you soon.
Bye-bye.