Study: Fasting Women Talk Less

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July 9, 2007 — Whether or not women really talk more than men, there may be one sure way to level the verbal playing field — fasting. The longer a woman fasts, the lower her voice gets and the less she uses it, according to Lebanese speech researchers who made use of Ramadan fasts to study how voices changed in 28 healthy women.

"The subjects were tested when they were not fasting and while fasting after the first week of intermittent fasting during Ramadan," report Abdul-Latif Hamdan, Abla Sibai and Charcel Rameh of American University of Beirut. Their study appears in the July issue of Journal of Voice.

All of the women had their voices acoustically analyzed and their larynxes inspected by video-endostroboscopy. They were also asked to describe how easy or difficult it was to speak.

The biggest complaint, made by 23 of the women, was that it was simply harder to say anything while fasting. About half of the women also reported vocal fatigue, which also tended to reduce the amount they said. The next most common symptom was a lowering of the voice, which was seen in one-fifth of the fasting women. A few of the women also showed some harshening of their voices as well.

The bottom line, say the researchers: "Fasting affects voice." More specifically, dehydration affects voice, since these Ramadan fasting includes refraining from liquids as well as food.

"[The study] supports what we as voice therapists constantly try and do — that is to get our clients to drink more water!" said Scott Jackson, a speech-language pathologist at Northbay Medical Center in Fairfield, Calif. and instructor at California State University-Sacramento.

"I think that the effect of fasting on the voice is more a result of dehydration than anything else," Jackson told Discovery News. "I see a lot of professional voice users (including singers and actors) who need constant reminding to drink water."

As for the fatigue and extra effort needed to speak by the fasting Lebanese women, that could come from both dehydration making the vocal folds less efficient as well as low blood sugar.

"People will feel like they have to 'push their voices more' in order for them to work," said Jackson.

The Lebanese study supports the prevailing wisdom, he said, that plenty of water and a healthy diet are essential for a healthy voice. Something to keep in mind this campaign season.