Editing Vocal loading (section)

== Loading on tissue in vocal folds ==
The fundamental frequency of speech for an average male is around 110&nbsp;Hz and for an average female around 220&nbsp;Hz. That means that for voiced sounds the vocal folds will hit together 110 or 220 times a second, respectively. Suppose then that a female is speaking continuously for an hour. Of this time perhaps five minutes is voiced speech. The folds will then hit together more than 30 thousand times an hour. It is intuitively clear that the vocal fold tissue will experience some tiring due to this large number of hits.

Vocal loading also includes other kinds of strain on the speech organs. These include all kinds of muscular strain in the speech organs, similarly as usage of any other muscles will experience strain if used for an extended period of time. However, researchers' largest interest lies in stress exerted on the vocal folds.