Comparative Effects of the Talk Test Methods and Submaximal Exercise on Variability of Speech Utterance, Heart Rate, and Relative Exercise Intensity
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Abstract
Introduction: Recent evidence indicates that the Talk Test (TT) is suitable as an alternative tool for gauging exercise intensity and prescription of exercise. However, the selection of the most appropriate TT that suits the cultural context for use in certain clinical exercise-based rehabilitation or in a wide variety of exercising individuals is unclearly defined as the TT is diverse for its speech provocation methods. This study compared the effects of different Talk Test (TT) methods and submaximal exercise on utterance variability, heart rates (HR), and relative exercise intensity. Materials and methods: Twenty-six participants performed 3 sessions of submaximal exercise tests with the Counting Talk Test (CTT), the non-regulated Monosyllabic Talk Test (nMTT) and the time-regulated Monosyllabic Talk Test (tMTT) respectively on a treadmill based on the Modified Bruce Protocol. Results: The TT methods significantly affected utterance rates (p < 0.01) and voice quality (p=0.042) but not HR (p=0.221) and relative exercise intensity (p=0.479). The nMTT demonstrated the greatest variability of utterance rate (Coefficient of variability, CV: 24.81% to 29.62%) and the most constant across the submaximal exercise (p > 0.05). The tMTT method possessed the most minor variability in utterance rate (CV: 1.12% to 4.70%), distinguishable at each exercise stage and was the only method showing a significant correlation between its utterance rates and exercise intensity (r=-0.397 to -0.647, p < 0.05). Conclusion: The tMTT could be employed for the estimation of intensity in cardiorespiratory exercise-based rehabilitation due to the significant association between its utterance rate and the resulting relative cardiorespiratory exercise intensity. Minor variability of utterance rate in the tMTT could reflect lung volume excursion per syllable which is in-controlled despite the increase in submaximal exercise. However, continuous vocalisation could be adopted in the tMTT while maintaining the time-regulated feature and investigated in the future.
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