Nonword Repetition Performance Differentiates Children Who Stutter With and Without Concomitant Speech Sound and Developmental Language Disorders

Purpose: The aim of this study was to examine how nonword repetition (NWR) performance may be impacted by the presence of concomitant speech and language disorders in young children who stutter (CWS). Method: One hundred forty-one children (88 CWS and 53 children who do not stutter [CWNS]) participated. CWS were divided into groups based on the presence of speech sound and/or language disorder or typical speech sound production and language abilities. NWR abilities were measured using stimuli composed of one- to four-syllable nonwords. Results: CWS with typical speech and language and CWNS had higher accuracy scores than CWS with concomitant speech and language disorders. We found no difference in accuracy scores between CWNS and CWS with typical speech and language abilities, nor did we find differences between CWS with speech sound disorder and CWS with both speech sound and language disorders. Accuracy decreased as nonword length increased for all groups. Conclusions: We found that the presence of a concomitant speech and language disorder was a driving factor behind poorer NWR performance in CWS. Accuracy scores differentiated CWS with concomitant disorders from CWS with typical speech and language but not CWS with typical speech and language from CWNS. Considering the speech and language abilities of CWS helped clarify poorer NWR performance and enhances generalizability to the population that exists clinically.

Clinical Features of Stroke

Stroke is a clinical condition that causes neurological dysfunction due to focal infarction or haemorrhage in the brain, spinal cord, or retina. These clinical features may take 24 hours or more and result in death. Stroke is one of the leading causes of disability and death. With the prolongation of life in societies, stroke and stroke-related risk factors become more and more important. Age, gender, race, heredity, ethnicity, hypertension, atrial fibrillation, diabetes, hyperlipidemia, smoking, transient ischemic attack, and physical inactivity are risk factors of stroke. Signs and symptoms of stroke vary according to occluded vessel. Mental dysfunction, speech and language disorders, motor and sensory impairment may occur as a result of stroke.

Studying peculiarities of variability of speech, language and motor processes in children with dysarthria

Introduction. The author investigates the problem of communicative development of children with dysarthria. The purpose of the research is to reveal the characteristic features of the variability of speech and motor processes in children with dysarthria (in particular, with a mild degree of pseudobulbar dysarthria) and to prove the existence of comorbidity levels of the disorders under study. Materials and Methods. The research is based on international and Russian refereed studies into language and speech, movements for organizing the communicative development of children with dysarthria (L. V. Lopatina, O. G. Prikhodko, T. V. Tumanova, T. B. Filicheva, G. V. Chirkina, Michael Robb, Kathleen Wermke). The research program was complemented by the application of an innovative technology based on biofeedback - Pablo System. The experimental study was conducted at preschool educational settings in Moscow (the Russian Federation). The sample consisted of 450 older preschool children with dysarthria (with a mild degree of pseudobulbar dysarthria) and a similar number of peers without speech disorders. Results. The article describes a modern interdisciplinary problem of studying speech and language and movement disorders in children with dysarthria (mild degree of pseudobulbar dysarthria, erased dysarthria, minimal dysarthric disorders) in the context of determining their codependency and conjugation. The study revealed variative characteristics of speech and language disorders and movement disorders in children with dysarthria. General and specific errors of speech and language and motor disorders in preschoolers of the experimental group were determined. The levels of comorbidity of speech-language and motor processes in children with dysarthria have been identified and scientifically substantiated. Conclusions. In conclusion, the author summarizes the main features of the variability of speech, language and motor processes in children with dysarthria.

COVID-19) PANDEMIC ON CHILDREN WITH SPEECH AND LANGUAGE DISORDERS AND THEIR FAMILIES

Objective: The aim is to determine the effects of the covid-19 pandemic on the functions and psychosocial conditions of children with speech and language disorders and their families. Material-Metod: Within the scope of the study, a questionnaire form created by the researchers through "Google Forms" was applied online to 70 families with speech and language disorders and 30 families with healthy children, feedback was obtained from the families of 100 children. In the questionnaire form applied to the families; before and during the covid-19 pandemic, there are questions about families' quality time with their children, daily life activities, emotional and anxiety situations. Study data were collected between June-July 2020. Results: Spending quality time with their families before the pandemic was significantly higher in the group with speech and language disorders compared to the families of the healthy group (p <0.05). During the pandemic, an increase in the use of television, tablets and computers was observed in the majority of children in both groups. In addition, families in both groups were found to have moderate/high levels of fear of transmission of the covid-19 virus to one of their families. Conclusion: It has been observed that the function and psycho-social impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on children with speech and language disorders and their families is similar to healthy children and their families. In particular, it has been observed that all families experience intense fear of transmission of the disease during this epidemic process, also have high levels of anxiety about future.

Speech and language assessment in the school year beginning. Example of Speech and Language Assessment Scale and practical aspects

The aim of this paper was to illustrate the approach of speech and language asssessment developed within the Interschool Speech Therapy Centers in Romania (Centrele Logopedice Interșcolare), at the beginning of the school year, in a pandemic context. It presents the initial evaluation of students and preschoolers, but also the way in which the complex evaluation of children identified with speech and language disorders is developed, fallowing the legislation and specific methodology. The Speech and Language Evaluation Scale is a very useful tool at this stage and beyond. This helps to condense the relevant data about children, to formulate the speech therapy diagnosis and to outline the therapeutic approach. The developed model addresses both aspects of psychomotor development and aspects of pronunciation and articulation. It is designed mainly for primary school students, but can also be applied to preschoolers. The presented case study is intended to highlight the way this model can be used, at various stages, in a specific intervention strategy.

Resting State fMRI Speech, Language, and Executive Function Network Connectivity in Children with and without Listening Difficulties

Listening Difficulties (LiD) are characterized by a child having reported issues with listening despite exhibiting normal hearing thresholds. LiD can often overlap with other developmental disorders, including speech and language disorders, and involve similar higher-order auditory processing. This study used resting-state functional MRI to examine functional brain networks associated with receptive and expressive speech and language and executive function in children with LiD and typically developing (TD) peers (average age of 10 years). We examined differences in region-of-interest (ROI)-to-ROI functional connectivity between: (1) the LiD group and the TD group and (2) within the LiD group, those participants who had seen a Speech-Language Pathologist and those who had not. The latter comparison was examined as a way of comparing children with and without speech and language disorders. Connections that differed between groups were analyzed for correlations with behavioral test data. The results showed functional connectivity differences between the LiD group and TD group in the executive function network and trends in the speech perception network. Differences were also found in the executive network between those LiD participants who had seen an SLP and those who had not. Several of these connectivity differences, particularly frontal-striatal connections, correlated with performance on behavioral tests: including tests that measure attention, executive function, and episodic memory, as well as speech, vocabulary, and sentence structure. The results of this study suggest that differences in functional connectivity in brain networks associated with speech perception and executive function may underlie and contribute to listening difficulties.

Toward Preventing Speech and Language Disorders of Known Genetic Origin: First Post-Intervention Results of Babble Boot Camp in Children With Classic Galactosemia

Purpose Babble Boot Camp (BBC) is a package of proactive activities and routines designed to prevent speech and language disorders in infants at predictable risk. It is implemented via parent training and currently undergoing clinical trial in children with a newborn diagnosis of classic galactosemia (CG), a metabolic disease with high risk of speech and language disorders. The purpose of this study is to provide updates to a previous pilot study and to present the first set of post-intervention results. Method The intervention and data collection occurred during child ages < 6–24 months, with follow-up assessments of speech and language at ages 2.5 and 3.5 years. Treatment targets included earliest vocalization rates, babble complexity, speech production accuracy, and vocabulary and syntactic growth. The oldest 15 children with CG (including three untreated controls) completed the first set of follow-up assessments. Aggregate data up to 10 months were available for 17 treated children with CG, six untreated children with CG, and six typical controls. Results At ages 7–9 months, babbling complexity, as measured with mean babbling level, was higher in the treated children with CG than in the untreated children with CG and the typical controls. Prior to 24 months of age, the treated children with CG had greater expressive but not receptive vocabulary sizes than an untreated control. Follow-up testing showed typical language scores for all 12 treated children with CG and typical articulation scores for 11 of these, whereas one of three untreated children with CG had low articulation and expressive language scores. Conclusions The BBC appears to be a viable intervention to support the speech and expressive language development of children with GC. Future studies will evaluate the relative contributions of the earliest and later BBC components to outcomes.

The role of the district pediatrician in the early diagnosis of speech developmental disorders in preschool children

Speech and language are the most important means of communication between a child and the outer world. Currently in the Russian Federation there is no reliable data on the prevalence of speech and language disorders in children. According to foreign authors, speech disorders are diagnosed in 3,4–6,4% in the population of preschool children, and language disorders are diagnosed in 8–10% of cases. Early identification of the causes of speech and language development disorders in children is a complex interdisciplinary problem. The authors have developed an algorithm for diagnosing speech and language developmental disorders in preschool children, where the district pediatrician plays the leading role. It is district pediatrician who can assess the speed of the child’s speech skills development, based on age norms, analyze the history data, risk factors, carry out a physical examination of the child, develop an individual program for conducting basic laboratory and instrumental studies and consult specialists. Dynamic observation of this category of children is important.

Individual Differences in Phonetic Plasticity Across Native and Nonnative Contexts

Purpose Individuals vary in their ability to learn the sound categories of nonnative languages (nonnative phonetic learning) and to adapt to systematic differences, such as accent or talker differences, in the sounds of their native language (native phonetic learning). Difficulties with both native and nonnative learning are well attested in people with speech and language disorders relative to healthy controls, but substantial variability in these skills is also present in the typical population. This study examines whether this individual variability can be organized around a common ability that we label “phonetic plasticity.” Method A group of healthy young adult participants ( N = 80), who attested they had no history of speech, language, neurological, or hearing deficits, completed two tasks of nonnative phonetic category learning, two tasks of learning to cope with variation in their native language, and seven tasks of other cognitive functions, distributed across two sessions. Performance on these 11 tasks was compared, and exploratory factor analysis was used to assess the extent to which performance on each task was related to the others. Results Performance on both tasks of native learning and an explicit task of nonnative learning patterned together, suggesting that native and nonnative phonetic learning tasks rely on a shared underlying capacity, which is termed “phonetic plasticity.” Phonetic plasticity was also associated with vocabulary, comprehension of words in background noise, and, more weakly, working memory. Conclusions Nonnative sound learning and native language speech perception may rely on shared phonetic plasticity. The results suggest that good learners of native language phonetic variation are also good learners of nonnative phonetic contrasts. Supplemental Material https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.16606778