Thesis (M.S.)--Brigham Young University. Dept of Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 30-33).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Indiana University, 1984. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (p. 82-85).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Indiana University, 1984. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (p. 82-85).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2005. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Diss. Linköping : Univ., 2004.

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1968. / Typescript. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 106-113).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1962. / Typescript. Vita. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 115-119).

O presente trabalho foi realizado em dois estudos. O primeiro deles (Estudo 1) teve como objetivo descrever e comparar as características acústicas das líquidas /l/; /4/ e /"do português brasileiro enquanto o segundo (Estudo 2), procurou descrever e comparar a percepção auditiva das líquidas apresentadas a juízes. Para isto, foi analisada acusticamente a produção das líquidas /l/; /4/ e /"realizada por 10 crianças sem alterações de fala e linguagem (GC), com idade compreendida entre 5:11 e 9:0 anos, e 10 com transtorno fonológico (GTF) e idade entre 5:0 e 12:0 anos. Após a avaliação fonológica, as crianças dos dois grupos foram solicitadas a repetir três vezes as sílabas /Na, Ni, Nu/; /4a, 4i, 4u/ e /"a, "i, "u/ e as palavras /se\'boNa/, /\'Nãma/, /\'mi"W, /<aka\'4\'/, /<i\'4afa/, /pa\'"asu/. A amostra de fala foi coletada e armazenada no CSL-Computarized Speech Laboratory 4300B/4500. Os parâmetros acústicos selecionados para a análise acústica do Estudo 1 foram: valores das freqüências formantes F1, F2 e F3, duração do som-alvo, duração da sílaba contendo o som-alvo, duração do som anterior (quando presente) e do subseqüente, duração da porção estável do som-alvo, valores da transição do som-alvo para a vogal subseqüente (/l/) e duração da transição do som-alvo para a vogal subseqüente (/l/), transição do som-alvo para o som inserido (/4/ e /") e do sominserido para a vogal subseqüente (/4/ e /"), duração da transição do som-alvo para o som inserido (/4/ e /"), slope (medida de velocidade de movimentação dos articuladores). Em seguida à análise dos dados, uma amostra de fala foi selecionada pela pesquisadora para o Estudo 2. Esta amostra foi apresentada a dois grupos de juízes da FMUSP, um composto por alunos do curso de graduação e outro por alunos de pós-graduação, todos fonoaudiólogos, que deveriam realizar um julgamento perceptivo-auditivo das sílabas e palavras. Os dados foram analisados estatisticamente por meio dos testes ANOVA, Teste-t e qui-quadrado (nível de significância adotado de 5%). Em relação às medidas acústicas, os resultados indicaram que as crianças do GC, de modo geral, foram capazes de produzir as sílabas e palavras solicitadas de maneira mais estável e precisa do que as crianças do GTF. A análise do slope mostrou que o GC apresentou movimentos mais rápidos e precisos, do ponto de vista articulatório, quando comparado ao GTF. Há evidencias que o GC se utilizou dos parâmetros acústicos de duração e das freqüências formantes para diferenciar uma líquida da outra, enquanto o GTF utilizou predominantemente a duração como diferenciador. Observando o comportamento acústico-articulatório do GC verificou-se que a língua apresenta uma maior movimentação ascendente e descendente durante a produção do /N/ e uma mudança ântero-posterior mais acentuada na produção do /4/. Em relação à análise perceptiva foi possível notar que, apesar do maior número de erros ter sido observado no grupo de juízes da pós-graduação, ambos tiveram mais dificuldade de julgar perceptivamente as sílabas e palavras com a líquida /4/. / The present research was divided in two different studies. The purpose of the first one (Study 1) was to describe and to compare the acoustic characteristics of the three Brazilian Portuguese liquid sounds /N/; /4/ and/"/. The aim of the second study (Study 2) was to describe and to compare the auditory perception of these liquids when presented to judges. To accomplish these two purposes, acoustic analyses were carried out of the production of /N/; /4/ and /"/ by 10 children without phonological disorders aged from 5:11 to 9:0 years old (CG) and 10 children with phonological disorders (PDG) aged between 5:0 and 12:0 years old. After a complete phonological evaluation the children in of both groups were asked to repeat three times the syllables /Na, Ni, Nu/; /4a, 4i, 4u/ e /"a, "i, "u/ and the words /se\'boNa/-onion, /\'Nãma/-mud, /\'mi"W-corn, /<aka\'4\'/-alligator, /<i\'4afa/-giraffe, /pa\'"asu/-clown. The samples were collected and stored in the CSL-Computerized Speech Laboratory 4300B/4500. The acoustic parameters selected to be analyzed for Study 1 were: formant frequencies F1, F2 and F3, duration of the target sound, duration of the syllable containing the liquid target sound, duration of the precedent (when present) and subsequent sound to the liquid, duration of the steady state from the target sound, transition of the target sound to the subsequent vowel (for /l/) and duration of transition of the target sound to the subsequent vowel (for /l/), transition of the target sound to the inserted sound (for /4/ e /") and from the target sound to the subsequent vowel (for /4/ e /"), duration of the transition from the target sound to the inserted sound (for /4/ e /") and slope analysis (measurement of rate of formantfrequency change ). After data analysis the researcher selected a speech sample for Study 2. The sample was presented to two groups of judges from FMUSP. One group was composed of graduate students and the other one by post-graduate students, all speech-pathologists. All of them were requested to perceptually judge syllables and words. Data were statistically analyzed using ANOVA, T test and chisquare (significance level adopted 5%). In general terms, results of Study 1 indicated that CG produced solicited syllables and words with more stability and precision than PDG. From the articulatory point of view, slope analysis showed that CG had steeper formant-frequency changes, and therefore presumably faster and more precise movements than PDG. Some evidence shows that CG used duration and formant frequencies to differentiate their liquid productions while PDG used duration prior to other acoustic parameters. Observing acoustic-articulatory parameters it was observed that CG presented ample ascendant and descendent movements during /N/ production while anterior and posterior movements were more visible during /4/ production. Study 2 results indicated that, even though the number of errors was greater for the post-graduation group of judges than for the graduate group, both of them presented more difficulty in perceptually judging the sound /4/ presented in syllables and words.

ABSTRACT Thus far, literature is scant in assessing the ability of children with conductive hearing impairment to understand everyday speech. This assessment is important in determining the functional ability of children with conductive hearing impairment. In order to identify the hearing ability of children with conductive hearing impairment, many assessments to date have used speech stimuli, such as syllables, words and sentences, to measure how well children perform. In general, these tests are useful in measuring speech recognition ability, but are not adequate in measuring the functional ability of children to understand the conversations they encounter in their daily lives. In addition, many of these tests are not designed to be interesting or engage the children whom they are assessing. The University of Queensland Understanding of Everyday Speech (UQUEST) Test was developed to address the above issues by providing a stimulating speech perception assessment for children aged 5 to 10 years. This overall objectives of this thesis were to: (1) determine the applicability of a computer-based, self-driven assessment of speech comprehension, the UQUEST, (2) establish normative UQUEST data for school children, (3) compare the UQUEST results in children with and without histories of otitis media in understanding everyday speech, and (4) measure speech understanding in noise by children with minimal conductive hearing impairment. A total of 1094 children were assessed using the UQUEST. All children were native speakers of English and attended schools in the Brisbane Metropolitan and Sunshine Coast regions within the state of Queensland, Australia. All children were firstly assessed using otoscopic examination, pure tone audiometry testing and tympanometry. Children with sensorineural hearing impairment were excluded from the study. Following the initial audiological assessments, the UQUEST was administered to all participants. Three experiments were performed on three cohorts of children selected from the pool of 1094 children. Experiment 1 aimed to assess whether the UQUEST is a feasible speech perception assessment tool for school children and to establish normative data in a sample of normally hearing children. ix In this experiment, participants were a total of 99 children (55 boys / 44 girls), attending Grade 3 and grade 4 (41/58, mean age = 8.3 yr, range = 7 – 10 yr, SD = 0.7). The results showed that the UQUEST is a feasible test of speech understanding in children aged 7 to 10 years. In general, the UQUEST scores decreased as the signal-to-noise-ratio (SNR) decreased from 10 to 0 dB. Normative data based on the scores of six passages of equal difficulty were established for the 0 dB and 5 dB SNR conditions. In addition, the children appeared to be captivated with the UQUEST task and the attention of all the children was sustained throughout the duration of the test. Experiment 2 determined whether children with histories of otitis media (experimental group) performed worse on the UQUEST in comparison to those children without histories of otitis media (OM). A total of 484 children (246 boys / 238 girls), attending Grade 3 (272, mean age = 8.25 yr, SD = 0.43) and Grade 4 (212, mean age = 9.28 yr, SD = 0.41), were assessed. Children were grouped according to the number of episodes of otitis media as per parental report (control: < 4 episodes; mild history group: 4-9 episodes; and moderate history group: > 9 episodes OM). All children had normal hearing as determined by otoscopy, pure tone audiometry screening and tympanometry results. Results showed no significant difference in UQUEST scores between the control group in comparison to the experimental groups. However, children with a history of OM demonstrated varying speech comprehension abilities. Some children had severe difficulty with the speech comprehension task, suggesting that in cases with extensively reported episodes of OM, performance on the UQUEST was compromised. Experiment 3 determined the prevalence of conductive hearing loss in the Australian primary school population and investigated the ability of school children with minimal conductive hearing loss to understand everyday speech under noisy conditions. Based on a sample of 1071 children (mean age = 7.7 yr; range = 5.3 - 11.7 yr), 10.2% of children were found to have conductive hearing loss in one or both ears. To evaluate the binaural speech comprehension ability of children, a sample of 542 children were divided into four groups according to their audiological assessment results: Group 1: 63 children (34 boys, 29 girls, mean age = 7.7 yr, SD = 1.5) who failed the pure tone audiometry and tympanometry tests in both ears; Group 2: 38 children (17 x boys, 21 girls, mean age = 7.5 yr, SD = 1.2) who passed pure tone audiometry and tympanometry in one ear but failed both tests in the other ear; Group 3 (control group): 357 children (187 boys, 170 girls, mean age = 7.8 yr, SD = 1.3) who passed pure tone audiometry and tympanometry in both ears; Group 4: 84 children (41 boys, 43 girls, mean age = 7.2 yr, SD = 1.3) who passed pure tone audiometry in both ears, but failed tympanometry in one or both ears. The results showed that Group 1 had the lowest mean scores of 60.8% - 69.3% obtained under noise conditions. Their scores were significantly lower than the corresponding scores of 69.3% - 75.3% obtained by children in Group 4; 70.5% - 76.5% obtained by children with unilateral conductive hearing loss (Group 2); and 72.0% - 80.3% obtained by their normally hearing peers (Group 3). This study confirmed that young children, who are known to have poorer speech understanding in noise than adults, show further disadvantage when a bilateral conductive hearing loss is present In summary, the UQUEST has been found to be a useful tool to measure children‟s understanding of everyday speech. This test could be successfully used as a measure of speech comprehension in background noise in children. The UQUEST met expectations of being an interesting and engaging test for children aged 5-10 years. In addition, the UQUEST scores showed that children performed worse when challenged by the more difficult noise conditions incorporated in the test design. The findings from this thesis demonstrated that, at the group level, children with histories of OM did not perform any differently from those without significant histories of OM. However, at the individual level, children with significant OM histories had degraded functional performance with low UQUEST scores. Lastly, this thesis provided much needed speech comprehension data obtained from children with minimal conductive hearing impairment and provided evidence that young children were more affected by the co-occurrence of environmental noise and bilateral conductive hearing loss than their normally hearing peers in understanding everyday speech.

O presente trabalho foi realizado em dois estudos. O primeiro deles (Estudo 1) teve como objetivo descrever e comparar as características acústicas das líquidas /l/; /4/ e /”do português brasileiro enquanto o segundo (Estudo 2), procurou descrever e comparar a percepção auditiva das líquidas apresentadas a juízes. Para isto, foi analisada acusticamente a produção das líquidas /l/; /4/ e /”realizada por 10 crianças sem alterações de fala e linguagem (GC), com idade compreendida entre 5:11 e 9:0 anos, e 10 com transtorno fonológico (GTF) e idade entre 5:0 e 12:0 anos. Após a avaliação fonológica, as crianças dos dois grupos foram solicitadas a repetir três vezes as sílabas /Na, Ni, Nu/; /4a, 4i, 4u/ e /”a, ”i, ”u/ e as palavras /se\'boNa/, /\'Nãma/, /\'mi”W, /<aka\'4\'/, /<i\'4afa/, /pa\'”asu/. A amostra de fala foi coletada e armazenada no CSL-Computarized Speech Laboratory 4300B/4500. Os parâmetros acústicos selecionados para a análise acústica do Estudo 1 foram: valores das freqüências formantes F1, F2 e F3, duração do som-alvo, duração da sílaba contendo o som-alvo, duração do som anterior (quando presente) e do subseqüente, duração da porção estável do som-alvo, valores da transição do som-alvo para a vogal subseqüente (/l/) e duração da transição do som-alvo para a vogal subseqüente (/l/), transição do som-alvo para o som inserido (/4/ e /”) e do sominserido para a vogal subseqüente (/4/ e /”), duração da transição do som-alvo para o som inserido (/4/ e /”), slope (medida de velocidade de movimentação dos articuladores). Em seguida à análise dos dados, uma amostra de fala foi selecionada pela pesquisadora para o Estudo 2. Esta amostra foi apresentada a dois grupos de juízes da FMUSP, um composto por alunos do curso de graduação e outro por alunos de pós-graduação, todos fonoaudiólogos, que deveriam realizar um julgamento perceptivo-auditivo das sílabas e palavras. Os dados foram analisados estatisticamente por meio dos testes ANOVA, Teste-t e qui-quadrado (nível de significância adotado de 5%). Em relação às medidas acústicas, os resultados indicaram que as crianças do GC, de modo geral, foram capazes de produzir as sílabas e palavras solicitadas de maneira mais estável e precisa do que as crianças do GTF. A análise do slope mostrou que o GC apresentou movimentos mais rápidos e precisos, do ponto de vista articulatório, quando comparado ao GTF. Há evidencias que o GC se utilizou dos parâmetros acústicos de duração e das freqüências formantes para diferenciar uma líquida da outra, enquanto o GTF utilizou predominantemente a duração como diferenciador. Observando o comportamento acústico-articulatório do GC verificou-se que a língua apresenta uma maior movimentação ascendente e descendente durante a produção do /N/ e uma mudança ântero-posterior mais acentuada na produção do /4/. Em relação à análise perceptiva foi possível notar que, apesar do maior número de erros ter sido observado no grupo de juízes da pós-graduação, ambos tiveram mais dificuldade de julgar perceptivamente as sílabas e palavras com a líquida /4/. / The present research was divided in two different studies. The purpose of the first one (Study 1) was to describe and to compare the acoustic characteristics of the three Brazilian Portuguese liquid sounds /N/; /4/ and/”/. The aim of the second study (Study 2) was to describe and to compare the auditory perception of these liquids when presented to judges. To accomplish these two purposes, acoustic analyses were carried out of the production of /N/; /4/ and /”/ by 10 children without phonological disorders aged from 5:11 to 9:0 years old (CG) and 10 children with phonological disorders (PDG) aged between 5:0 and 12:0 years old. After a complete phonological evaluation the children in of both groups were asked to repeat three times the syllables /Na, Ni, Nu/; /4a, 4i, 4u/ e /”a, ”i, ”u/ and the words /se\'boNa/-onion, /\'Nãma/-mud, /\'mi”W-corn, /<aka\'4\'/-alligator, /<i\'4afa/-giraffe, /pa\'”asu/-clown. The samples were collected and stored in the CSL-Computerized Speech Laboratory 4300B/4500. The acoustic parameters selected to be analyzed for Study 1 were: formant frequencies F1, F2 and F3, duration of the target sound, duration of the syllable containing the liquid target sound, duration of the precedent (when present) and subsequent sound to the liquid, duration of the steady state from the target sound, transition of the target sound to the subsequent vowel (for /l/) and duration of transition of the target sound to the subsequent vowel (for /l/), transition of the target sound to the inserted sound (for /4/ e /”) and from the target sound to the subsequent vowel (for /4/ e /”), duration of the transition from the target sound to the inserted sound (for /4/ e /”) and slope analysis (measurement of rate of formantfrequency change ). After data analysis the researcher selected a speech sample for Study 2. The sample was presented to two groups of judges from FMUSP. One group was composed of graduate students and the other one by post-graduate students, all speech-pathologists. All of them were requested to perceptually judge syllables and words. Data were statistically analyzed using ANOVA, T test and chisquare (significance level adopted 5%). In general terms, results of Study 1 indicated that CG produced solicited syllables and words with more stability and precision than PDG. From the articulatory point of view, slope analysis showed that CG had steeper formant-frequency changes, and therefore presumably faster and more precise movements than PDG. Some evidence shows that CG used duration and formant frequencies to differentiate their liquid productions while PDG used duration prior to other acoustic parameters. Observing acoustic-articulatory parameters it was observed that CG presented ample ascendant and descendent movements during /N/ production while anterior and posterior movements were more visible during /4/ production. Study 2 results indicated that, even though the number of errors was greater for the post-graduation group of judges than for the graduate group, both of them presented more difficulty in perceptually judging the sound /4/ presented in syllables and words.