The role of strap muscles in phonation--in vivo canine laryngeal model.

In spite of the presumed importance of the strap muscles on laryngeal valving and speech production, there is little research concerning the physiological role and the functional differences among the strap muscles. Generally, the strap muscles have been shown to cause a decrease in the fundamental frequency (F0) of phonation during contraction. In this study, an in vivo canine laryngeal model was used to show the effects of strap muscles on the laryngeal function by measuring the F0, subglottic pressure, vocal intensity, vocal fold length, cricothyroid distance, and vertical laryngeal movement. Results demonstrated that the contraction of sternohyoid and sternothyroid muscles corresponded to a rise in subglottic pressure, shortened cricothyroid distance, lengthened vocal fold, and raised F0 and vocal intensity. The thyrohyoid muscle corresponded to lowered subglottic pressure, widened cricothyroid distance, shortened vocal fold, and lowered F0 and vocal intensity. We postulate that the mechanism of altering F0 and other variables after stimulation of the strap muscles is due to the effects of laryngotracheal pulling, upward or downward, and laryngotracheal forward bending, by the external forces during strap muscle contraction.