A Focus on the Voice: Attention as a Unifying Mechanism Underlying Vocal Training and Mindfulness

ABSTRACT

Recent decades have generated a proliferation of research into the phenomenon known as mindfulness. This literature gives voice and speech researchers an opportunity to reconceptualize and assess their practices. Voice and Speech Training (VST) for actors shares certain techniques and attitudes in common with mindfulness. Thus, it is plausible that these two practices rely on similar psychological and neurological mechanisms and may produce similar benefits. We provide an interdisciplinary review of the contemporary literature regarding vocal production, VST practices, mindfulness, and meditation, highlighting conceptual and practical connections between them. We propose that attention is a common mechanism that unifies VST practices and mindfulness. We provide an overview of how attention and mindfulness meditation have been conceptualized and summarize recent empirical studies on their possible relationship. Finally, we suggest future directions for how interdisciplinary research teams might investigate the relationship between VST, mindfulness, and attention, and bring empirical methodologies to bear on questions of artistic significance.

KEYWORDS:

• Voice
• Mindfulness
• Attention
• Meditation
• Neuroscience

Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank Professor David Ley and Dr. Anthony Singhal at the University of Alberta for discussions leading to the genesis of this article. Thank you to Dr. Singhal and anonymous reviewers at the Voice and Speech Review for providing comments on earlier drafts of this manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

1. The Text Recycling Research Project (TRRP), a U.S-based multi-institution initiative funded by the National Science Foundation, defines Developmental Recycling as “the reuse of material from unpublished documents.” It classifies this as a common and generally accepted research practice (Hall, Moskovitz, and Pemberton 2021).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Shannon Blanchet

Shannon Blanchet is an Assistant Professor of Drama specializing in Voice and Acting at the University of Saskatchewan. She holds a BFA in Acting and MFA in Theatre Voice Pedagogy from the University of Alberta. In addition to an active creative practice as an actor, director, and improviser, her research fuses principles and methods from theatre, voice pedagogy, psychology, and cognitive neuroscience to investigate the relationship between experience and expression.

Alice Elizabeth Atkin

Alice Atkin is a PhD Candidate in neuroscience and an Assistant Lecturer in psychology at the University of Alberta. Alice Atkin holds an MSc in psychology from the University of Alberta, and a BA in psychology from the University of Victoria. Her primary research interests include the use of EEG to investigate attention, memory, decision-making, and motor control processes. She also studies health psychology, with a focus on video games and motivation as well as driving and impairment.