A Comparative Study of Speech Perception in Young Severely Retarded Children and Normally Developing Infants

1980 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 419-428 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca E. Eilers ◽  
D. Kimbrough Oller
Keyword(s):  
Steady State ◽  
Speech Perception ◽  
School Children ◽  
Elementary School Children ◽  
Discrimination Performance ◽  
Spectral Information ◽  
Speech Discrimination ◽  
Head Turn ◽  
Spectral Changes ◽  
Spectral Cues

The discrimination of minimally paired speech sounds by seven retarded children with a mean age of 3 years, 2 months and a mean IQ of 38.4 was compared with the discrimination performance of eight normally developing 7-month-old infants. Children and infants were tested using the Visually Reinforced Infant Speech Discrimination (VRISD) paradigm in which they were taught to respond with a head turn to a change in a repeating background auditory stimulus. Responses were reinforced by activation of an animated toy. All children proved to be conditionable and both groups evidenced discrimination of the speech contrasts tested. The data suggest that the retarded children have more difficulty processing a contrast cued by rapid spectral changes (often associated with consonant discrimination) than they do a contrast cued by steady-state spectral information (often associated with the perception of slowly articulated vowels): The normally developing infants did not find rapid spectral cues more difficult than steady-state cues. These results parallel those of Tallal (1976) who found that dynamic cues were specifically difficult for dysphasic children (with normal nonverbal intelligence), but not for linguistically-normal elementary school children.

Speech Perception in Adult Subjects With Familial Dyslexia

1992 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 192-200 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michele L. Steffens ◽  
Rebecca E. Eilers ◽  
Karen Gross-Glenn ◽  
Bonnie Jallad
Keyword(s):  
Steady State ◽  
Speech Perception ◽  
Synthetic Speech ◽  
Acoustic Cues ◽  
State Dynamic ◽  
Spectral Cues ◽  
Temporal Cues ◽  
Familial Dyslexia ◽  
Overall Performance

Speech perception was investigated in a carefully selected group of adult subjects with familial dyslexia. Perception of three synthetic speech continua was studied: /a/-//, in which steady-state spectral cues distinguished the vowel stimuli; /ba/-/da/, in which rapidly changing spectral cues were varied; and /sta/-/sa/, in which a temporal cue, silence duration, was systematically varied. These three continua, which differed with respect to the nature of the acoustic cues discriminating between pairs, were used to assess subjects’ abilities to use steady state, dynamic, and temporal cues. Dyslexic and normal readers participated in one identification and two discrimination tasks for each continuum. Results suggest that dyslexic readers required greater silence duration than normal readers to shift their perception from /sa/ to /sta/. In addition, although the dyslexic subjects were able to label and discriminate the synthetic speech continua, they did not necessarily use the acoustic cues in the same manner as normal readers, and their overall performance was generally less accurate.

scholarly journals Factors Affecting Speech Discrimination in Children with Cochlear Implants: Evidence from Early-Implanted Infants

2016 ◽  
Vol 27 (06) ◽  
pp. 480-488 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer Phan ◽  
Derek M. Houston ◽  
Chad Ruffin ◽  
Jonathan Ting ◽  
Rachael Frush Holt
Keyword(s):  
Speech Perception ◽  
Cochlear Implants ◽  
Cochlear Implantation ◽  
Pure Tone ◽  
Early Period ◽  
Discrimination Performance ◽  
Speech Discrimination ◽  
Communication Mode ◽  
Factors Affecting ◽  
Pure Tone Average

Background: To learn words and acquire language, children must be able to discriminate and correctly perceive phonemes. Although there has been much research on the general language outcomes of children with cochlear implants (CIs), little is known about the development of speech perception with regard to specific speech processes, such as speech discrimination. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the development of speech discrimination in infants with CIs and identify factors that might correlate with speech discrimination skills. Research Design: Using a Hybrid Visual Habituation procedure, we tested infants with CIs on their ability to discriminate the vowel contrast /i/-/u/. We also gathered demographic and audiological information about each infant. Study Sample: Children who had received CIs before 2 yr of age served as participants. We tested the children at two post cochlear implantation intervals: 2–4 weeks post CI stimulation (N = 17) and 6–9 mo post CI stimulation (N = 10). Data Collection and Analysis: The infants’ mean looking times during the novel versus old trials of the experiment were measured. A linear regression model was used to evaluate the relationship between the normalized looking time difference and the following variables: chronological age, age at CI stimulation, gender, communication mode, and best unaided pure-tone average. Results: We found that the best unaided pure-tone average predicted speech discrimination at the early interval. In contrast to some previous speech perception studies that included children implanted before 3 yr of age, age at CI stimulation did not predict speech discrimination performance. Conclusions: The results suggest that residual acoustic hearing before implantation might facilitate speech discrimination during the early period post cochlear implantation; with more hearing experience, communication mode might have a greater influence on the ability to discriminate speech. This and other studies on age at cochlear implantation suggest that earlier implantation might not have as large an effect on speech perception as it does on other language skills.

scholarly journals Relationship between Behavioral Infant Speech Perception and Hearing Age for Children with Hearing Loss

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (19) ◽  
pp. 4566
Author(s):  
Kristin M. Uhler ◽  
Alexander M. Kaizer ◽  
Kerry A. Walker ◽  
Phillip M. Gilley
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Speech Perception ◽  
Regression Models ◽  
Speech Discrimination ◽  
Head Turn ◽  
Hearing Status ◽  
Infant Speech Perception ◽  
Early Speech ◽  
Children With Hearing Loss ◽  
Vowel Contrast

(1) Background: Research has demonstrated that early intervention for children who are hard-of-hearing (CHH) facilitates improved language development. Early speech perception abilities may impact CHH outcomes and guide future intervention. The objective of this study was to examine the use of a conditioned head turn (CHT) task as a measure of speech discrimination in CHH using a clinically feasible protocol. (2) Methods: Speech perception was assessed for a consonant and vowel contrast among 57 CHH and 70 children with normal hearing (CNH) aged 5–17 months using a CHT paradigm. (3) Results: Regardless of hearing status, 74% of CHH and 77% of CNH could discriminate /a-i/, and 55% of CHH and 56% of CNH could discriminate /ba-da/. Regression models revealed that both CHH and CNH performed better on /ba-da/ at 70 dBA compared to 50 dBA. Performance by hearing age showed no speech perception differences for CNH and children with mild hearing loss for either contrast. However, children with hearing losses ≥ 41 dB HL performed significantly poorer than CNH for /a-i/. (4) Conclusions: This study demonstrates the clinical feasibility of assessing early speech perception in infants with hearing loss and replicates previous findings of speech perception abilities among CHH and CNH.

Teacher Identification of Elementary School Children with Hearing Loss

1978 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 24-28 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard H. Nodar
Keyword(s):  
Elementary School ◽  
Hearing Loss ◽  
School Children ◽  
Elementary School Children ◽  
Total Sample ◽  
Hearing Impaired ◽  
Teacher Interviews ◽  
Teacher Screening ◽  
Children With Hearing Loss ◽  
Hearing Problems

The teachers of 2231 elementary school children were asked to identify those with known or suspected hearing problems. Following screening, the data were compared. Teachers identified 5% of the children as hearing-impaired, while screening identified only 3%. There was agreement between the two procedures on 1%. Subsequent to the teacher interviews, rescreening and tympanometry were conducted. These procedures indicated that teacher screening and tympanometry were in agreement on 2% of the total sample or 50% of the hearing-loss group. It was concluded that teachers could supplement audiometry, particularly when otoscopy and typanometry are not available.

Use of Revision by Elementary-School Stutterers and Nonstutterers during Oral Reading

1973 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 584-585 ◽  
Author(s):  
Franklin H. Silverman ◽  
Dean E. Williams
Keyword(s):  
Elementary School ◽  
School Children ◽  
Oral Reading ◽  
Elementary School Children ◽  
Reading Errors

This paper describes a dimension of the stuttering problem of elementary-school children—less frequent revision of reading errors than their nonstuttering peers.

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