How Stress Affects Your Voice

The mind has difficulty distinguishing between perceived and real threats, and the body will likely react in the same way. Even routine situations like a team check-in, coffee with a coworker, or a salary discussion, can trigger your brain to respond as if you were being chased by a tiger. (Health Harvard, 2024; Rolling Strong, 2019).

During heightened emotions, especially feelings of threat, stress or anxiety, your autonomic nervous system (ANS), which is responsible for automatic body functions like breathing, heart rate, and muscle tone, can be disrupted. For your voice, this can mean increased tension, vocal fatigue, and changes the ease and clarity of speech.

The  ANS has two branches: the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) and the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS). The SNS activates when the brain perceives a threat, producing a fight, flight, freeze or fawn response. In communication, this may appear as:

1. Shallow Chest Breathing: 

• Limits breath support needed for projection, volume consistency, and vocal confidence.
• May slightly reduce oxygen levels to the brain, impacting your focus and clarity of thought.
• Rapid breathing can increase your heart rate. 
• Reduced breath support can increase feelings of anxiety and stress, creating a feedback loop.
  

2. Tightness and Tension in your Neck, Shoulders, Jaw and Throat (Larynx):
   
   “When the body is tense, the voice has no choice but to follow.” – Janet Rodgers, Voice Coach

• Physical tension often mirrors emotional stress. When muscles in these areas tighten, the speaking system is affected, which increases effort  and may cause other muscles to compensate.
   
• Neck and shoulder tension can make throat muscles overactive, changing vocal fold vibration. The voice may become breathy or strained and breathing may become more shallow.

• Jaw tension reduces mouth mobility, impacting clarity and resonance. The tongue may move less freely which can slur speech. As a result, you may begin to push your voice from your throat, creating increased strain, effort and risk to vocal health (Craig et al., 2015).
  
• The throat (larynx aka voice box) is surrounded by a variety of delicate muscles used to fine tune pitch and control how your vocal folds vibrate. When there’s increased tension, the vocal folds may come together too forcefully, resulting in a strained voice.
  
• Upper back tension and poor posture may lift the voice box up, reducing breath support and making projection, resonance, and vocal effort more challenging (Mathieson et al., 2009).
  
• Over time, this tension and compensation can lead to muscle tension dysphonia (MTD), where tension becomes habitual and voice effort feels constant (Mathieson et al., 2009; Van Houtte, Van Lierde, & Claeys, 2011).

3. Pitch and Loudness Impairment 

• Pitch may rise unintentionally, and loudness can become inconsistent or difficult to control become higher unintentionally. Your voice may trail off at ends of sentences, making your sound less confident and unsure
  
• Adrenaline can cause the voice to quiver, crack or tremble, reducing confidence
  

4. Reduced Resonance and Enunciation
    

• Tension in the throat and jaw alters vocal tract shape, leaving the voice thinner and more nasal 

• Restricted mouth movement may make speech less clear, mumbled or slurred 

5. Physiological Impact
   

• Dry mouth can impact smoothness and clarity of speech
  
• Elevated heart rate can affect breath support and vocal stability

Stress doesn’t just impact how your voice sounds but also how others perceive you and how you perceive yourself. 
 

1. Speaker Perception: A voice that trails off, cracks, is monotone, or tense can make the speaker feel less confident. This could lead to avoiding speaking opportunities, affecting work performance and social engagement
   
2. Listener Perception: Unintentional pitch changes, shaky voice, reduced volume can all come across as nervousness.  You may also come across as less credible and trustworthy and others may pass on you for speaking opportunities. 

3. Connection and Warmth: A flat, thin, quiet voice may be less engaging and make the speaker feel less connected or distant from the listener and vice versa. 
   
4. Cognitive Overload: When you’re managing stress in your body, you have less resources to focus on delivery. This could lead to increased fillers, repeating yourself, getting off topic and rambling
   

Emotions are not the issue. It makes complete sense and is valid that you may feel nervous about an interview but that nervousness doesn’t necessarily need to control how you communicate. Here are some ways you can gain control of your voice when stressed:    

1. Check your Breathing
   
   “When you calm your breath, you calm your voice — and often, your mind follows.” – Adapted from mindfulness teachings

• Ensure your posture allows for full expansion of  the main breathing muscle found in your upper abdomen – your diaphragm. Your diaphragm should expand (down and out) when you inhale, and passively return on the exhale 
  
• Take time to breathe. On average take a supportive breath every 8-10 words and don’t rush the inhale. Typical speech inhale lasts about 1.5 seconds (Hixon, Weismer, & Hoit, 2014)

2. Release Physical Tension
   

• Various massages and stretches can support the voice with specific focus on the neck (all sides), shoulders, jaw and upper back. You can do several of these on your own guided by an SLP and/or a registered massage therapist. Remember it’s not just about the throat but all of the surrounding muscles too.

• This physical tension may also signal to the nervous system that something is wrong or that there’s a threat. This may increase the emotions of stress and anxiety therefore increasing your fight, flight, freeze or fawn response – just like a negative feedback loop. Tension → SNS activation → feeling increased stress → more tension.

3. Warm-up the Voice
   

• Just like it’s recommended to warm-up for exercises at the gym or for a run, the same principles are true for speaking – which is exercise. Warm-ups such as humming, pitch glides, yawn-sighs and blowing through a straw (SOVT) are great ways to support the voice.
  
• It’s often recommended to do these before and after speaking, especially for prolonged speaking.

4. Vocal Hygiene
   

• Ensure you are drinking enough water (around 1.5-2 liters a day). If you speak a lot you may benefit from a higher water intake
  
• Rest your voice. Ask a question to pass the conversational turn, giving you time to rest. After longer bouts of speaking, take a longer vocal rest.
  
• Reduce throat clearing. Throat clearing slams your vocal folds together which may lead to inflammation, discomfort and often leads to the desire to clear your throat again and again.  

5. Mindfulness Breaks
   

• Take intentional pauses to check-in and reset your breath, posture, muscle tension and thoughts
  
• Mindful breathing and relaxation can activate the parasympathetic nervous system, reducing SNS-driven tension

Reset Example: 5 minutes
               

1. Close your eyes softly 
2. Notice your breathing pattern, posture and any tension
3. Release tension by rolling your shoulders and unclenching your jaw 
4. Take a slow deep breath, in for 3 seconds, hold for 3 seconds, out for 3 seconds 
5. Acknowledge stressful thoughts without judgement 
6. Continue focusing on your breath 
7. Say an affirming phrase such as “What I say matters, I deserve to take my time”

Open your eyes and continue your tasks with improved breath and posture.

Stress, anxiety and nervousness don’t just live in your mind but they show up in your body too, particularly in your voice. Shallow breaths, shaky voice, tight muscles and inconsistent volume are your body’s way of reacting to stress. Despite these automatic responses, you do have the power to manage the impact of these effects. Strategies include giving yourself time to use an effective quality and quantity of breath, using a supportive posture, releasing muscle tension, warming up your voice, practicing vocal hygiene and incorporating mindfulness breaks. As a result, you have the ability to communicate with a clear, confident and resilient voice, despite the emotions you’re experiencing.

• Behrman, A., & Sulter, G. (2000). Vocal hygiene: Protecting your voice. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 31(3), 184–189. https://doi.org/10.1044/0161-1461.3103.184

• Craig, J., Tomlinson, C. A., Stevens, K., Kotagal, K., Fornadley, J., Jacobson, B., … Francis, D. O. (2015). Combining voice therapy and physical therapy: A novel approach to treating muscle tension dysphonia. Journal of Voice, 29(2), 209–221. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvoice.2014.09.018

• Health Harvard. (2024, April 3). Understanding the stress response. Retrieved October 16, 2025, from https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/understanding-the-stress-response

• Hixon, T. J., Weismer, G., & Hoit, J. D. (2014). Preclinical speech science: Anatomy, physiology, acoustics, perception (5th ed.). Plural Publishing.

• Kabat-Zinn, J. (2013). Full catastrophe living: Using the wisdom of your body and mind to face stress, pain, and illness (2nd ed.). Bantam Books.

• Mathieson, L., Hirani, S. P., Epstein, R., Baken, R., Wood, G., & Rubin, J. (2009). Laryngeal manual therapy: A preliminary study to examine its treatment effects in the management of muscle tension dysphonia. Journal of Voice, 23(3), 353–366. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvoice.2008.04.003

• Rolling Strong. (2019, March 6). Stress: It’s all about the tiger. Retrieved October 16, 2025, from https://www.rollingstrong.com/stress-its-all-about-the-tiger/

• Sataloff, R. T. (2021). Professional voice: The science and art of clinical care (5th ed.). Plural Publishing.