A-190 An Examination of the Equivalence of the in-Person and Remote Administration of the Feifer Assessment of Reading Screening Form

Objective As psychologists rely more on technology while navigating the digital world, we must adapt existing assessment tools. In response to this need, a process was designed for conducting remote administration of the Feifer Assessment of Reading Screening Form (FAR Screening Form; Feifer, 2015), which was designed to identify children “at risk” for developmental dyslexia. Our current study evaluates the equivalence between remote, online administration and in-person administration of the FAR Screening Form. Method This is a paired case control study in which 70 participants were administered the FAR Screening Form in an online, remote format, following a specific procedure to retain the validity of scores. These individuals were matched based on age, sex, education, and race with participants from the standardization sample of the FAR Screening Form. Results Independent-samples t-tests were conducted, and determined no significant effect of administration format for scores on the Phonemic Awareness (PA) and Semantic Concepts (SC) subtests, as well as the overall FAR Screening Index. Rapid Automatic Naming (RAN), a speeded subtest, showed a significant effect for administration format. Due to this effect, a new FAR Remote Screening Index (SRI) was created that includes only the PA and SC subtests. The SRI has demonstrated reliability and validity consistent with the FAR Screening Index. Conclusions The present study suggests that remote and in-person administrations of the PA and SC subtests of the FAR Screening Form are generally equivalent. During remote administration, it’s not recommended to use the RAN subtest; the SRI should be used to derive the screening index score.

Phonological awareness, verbal working memory and rapid automatic naming as indicators of vocabulary development in preschool children

Introduction. According to the lexical restructuring model, the development of vocabulary initiates the development of phonological representations. Therefore, it can be predicted that children with developed vocabulary will possess very specific phonological representations of words. Aim. The aim of this research was to determine the significance of phonological awareness, verbal working memory, and rapid automatic naming as indicators of the development of expressive and receptive vocabulary in preschool children. Method. The research included 86 children of typical development. For the assessment of phonological awareness, verbal working memory, rapid automatic naming, expressive and receptive vocabulary, the subtests of Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals -Fourth Edition battery were used. Results. The results showed that the model containing age, phonological awareness, verbal working memory, and rapid automatic naming predicted 51% of the achievement variance on expressive vocabulary tasks (F = 7.73, df1 = 2, df2 = 75, p < .001) and 38% of the achievement variance on receptive vocabulary tasks (F = 4.65, df1 = 2, df2 = 75, p < .001). In the final model, only the tasks of phoneme identification, phoneme substitution, and rapid automatic naming (p < .05) stood out as statistically significant indicators of expressive vocabulary. On the other hand, statistically significant indicators of receptive vocabulary included analysis and synthesis of phonemes, verbal working memory, and rapid automatic naming (p < .05). Conclusion. The results showed that age, phonological awareness, verbal working memory, and rapid automatic naming significantly contributed to vocabulary development in children before reading acquisition.

Does self-correction in the Rapid Naming Test reflect cognitive and language performance in teens?

ABSTRACT Objective: to describe the occurrence of self-correction among adolescents in the rapid automatic naming test and the influence of schooling, type of visual stimulation and cognitive and language skills. Methods: 83 typical adolescents from 11 to 16 years old, enrolled from 6th to 9th grade of two public schools in Belo Horizonte participated in the study. The following tests were applied: rapid automatic naming, NEUPSILIN Brief Neuropsychological Assessment Instrument and Boston Naming. During rapid naming, substitutions and self-correction were accounted for. The variation in the number of errors, with and without self-correction, was related to schooling, functions and skills evaluated. Appropriate statistical tests were applied, adopting a significance level lower than 0.05. Results: individuals who made no mistakes had a better performance in attention, executive functions, memory, and vocabulary than those who made. Adolescents who performed self-correction were better at attention than those who did not correct themselves. Non-alphanumeric stimuli presented a higher occurrence of self-correction. Non-alphanumeric and alphanumeric tasks differed in terms of number of errors, both with and without self-correction. Adolescents from the early and late years of middle school differed regarding self-correction in the task of naming letters. Conclusion: self-correction was frequent in the evaluated sample and differentiated the group of adolescents who self-corrected or not, regarding attention, executive functions and vocabulary.