title: Sudden infant death syndrome: cry characteristics.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To acoustically evaluate the cries of SIDS infants and compare these cry features to a group of healthy term (HT) infants, as well as previously published results for SIDS infants.
  
  
  METHODS
  Pain-induced crying episodes were collected from four infants during the first weeks of life that later died of SIDS. Temporal and spectral features of each crying episode were characterized based on measures of cry duration, cry fundamental frequency (F0), and cry formant frequencies (F1 and F2).
  
  
  RESULTS
  The SIDS infants were found to produce cries with longer duration compared to HT infants. The cries of SIDS infants also differed from HT infants in regard to the absolute difference in F2-F1 frequency.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The acoustic features considered in the present study support the contention that the cries of SIDS infants are reflective of atypical respiratory-laryngeal control. Although research of this nature is rare, there is evidence to suggest an acoustic profile of crying that is specific to SIDS.
authors.affiliation: Department of Communication Disorders, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand. michael.robb@canterbury.ac.nz
authors.forename: Michael P
authors.initials: MP
authors.lastname: Robb
authors.forename: David H
authors.initials: DH
authors.lastname: Crowell
authors.forename: Peter
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Dunn-Rankin
mesh_terms: D016022:Case-Control Studies; D003448:Crying / Q000502:physiology* / Q000523:psychology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D007830:Larynx / Q000503:physiopathology; D008297:Male; D010146:Pain / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000523:psychology; D013018:Sound Spectrography; D013061:Speech Acoustics; D013398:Sudden Infant Death
keywords: Acoustic analysis; Cry; Infancy; SIDS