Noise, Working Practice and Self-Reported Voice Disorders in Teachers
Baiba Trinite
The questionnaire study was aimed to investigate how teachers percept indoor and outdoor noise in the classrooms and their working practice, to discover the relationships between self-evaluated voice disorders and self-evaluated voice ergonomics factors, and to investigate teachers readiness to use voice amplification systems. Participant and methods. The online questionnaire based on the Voice Ergonomic Risk Factors Checklist was distributed to teachers. Two respondent groups were set out based on the questionnaire results: Voice Disorder group (n = 53, M = 44.43 years, SD = 10.84) and Healthy Voice group (n = 53, M = 44.4 years, SD = 11.86). Results. 88% of teachers reported noise from outdoors and 49% noise from information technology equipment during the lessons. Teachers with self-reported voice disorders had higher activity noise in classrooms (p = .01), more audible noise from ventilation systems (p = .01) and adjacent rooms (p = .05). Their voice use was more excessive and continuous (p = .02) and louder (p = .05), the use of unergonomic body postures during the workday were more common than in teachers with self-reported voice health (p = .01). Teachers with self-reported voice disorders reported higher level of stress during the workday than teachers without voice disorders: MVD = 3.11 (SD = 0.97), MHV = 2.55 (SD = 1.26); χ2 = 13.86, p = .01. Teachers with voice disorders (32%) considered that they need voice amplification systems in everyday teaching (χ2 = 4.24, p = .04). Conclusion. Teachers can identify voice ergonomics risk factors, and an online questionnaire is considered as a valuable tool for raising awareness about voice ergonomics.
Keywords
Voice ergonomics, Teachers, Noise, Working practice, Voice amplification systems.
