Acoustic Characteristics of Cry in Infants with Hyperbilirubinemia - A Preliminary Study

Objective: The study delves into the use of infant cry as a powerful tool for understanding infants' physiological neurological and emotional states. Its primary objective is to compare the acoustic characteristics of cries in Healthy full-term infants and full-term infants with Hyperbilirubinemia. Materials and method:A total of 30 infants took part in the study, with 15 being full-term infants with Hyperbilirubinemia and 15 Healthy full-term infants. Cry samples were recorded and meticulously analyzed using PRAAT software to measure Fundamental frequency measures, Frequency perturbation measures, amplitude perturbation measures, Noise-related measures, and Formants (F1, F2, F3). Statistical analysis: Using SPSS Version 23.0 independent t was used to analyse the cries between healthy infants and infants with Hyperbilirubinemia Results:The findings revealed that significant differences were observed in the acoustic characteristics of the infant cry fundamental frequency F0 and formants (F1, F2, F3) between infants with hyperbilirubinemia and Healthy infants Conclusion: The infants with Hyperbilirubinemia exhibited higher average values in F0, jitter, shimmer, F1, F2, and F3 compared to Healthy full-term and significant difference(p<0.05) was observed in mean, minimum and maximum F0 This result indicates that the higher Fo, jitter, shimmer and Formants are related with high risk factors in infants. Key words: Acoustic analysis, infant cry, fundamental frequency, formants. Hyperbilirubinemia.