Choosing an effective and efficient phonological treatment approach is an important decision for clinicians when treating children with phonological deviations. Current research supports the effectiveness of phonological treatment, but few studies have compared two approaches. More comparative studies are essential to support clinical intervention for children who are highly unintelligible. This single-subject study was designed to compare the effectiveness of two phonologically-based treatment approaches in facilitating an intelligible speech production system for one highly unintelligible preschool female. Multiple baselines across behaviors with an alternating treatment design were used in this descriptive study. This study sought to answer the following questions: (a) Is there a clinically significant difference between the effectiveness of the cycling approach and the minimal pairs approach in treating a child with phonological disorders? and (b) Do the phonological cycling and/or the minimal pairs treatment approaches result in generalization of treated sounds in a targeted pattern to untrained words containing the treated sounds and to untreated sounds/sound contexts in the same phonological pattern? Using the phonological assessment instrument, the APP-R in conjunction with the CAPD, four phonological deviations were chosen for phonological remediation. Two deviations were assigned to the phonological cycling approach (Hodson & Paden, 1991) and two to the minimal pairs approach (Blache, 1989; Fokes, 1982). Remediation alternated between the two approaches every 6 sessions, beginning with the cycling approach, for a total of 24 sessions. Treated sounds from each targeted deviation were taught and reassessed using the APP-R to compare treatment effectiveness. To examine generalization of targeted phonological patterns to phonemes in other contexts, periodic probes of treated sounds within untrained words and untreated sounds/sound contexts in the same pattern were administered. Results of the CAPD indicate that both treatment methods were effective in improving some of the treated phonological deviations for this subject though neither method was more effective than the other. Probe words indicated generalization to untrained words and untreated sounds/sound contexts in some phonological patterns. These findings support the phonologically-based theory of remediation: the goal of phonological treatment is developing a whole phonological system, rather than perfecting targeted deviations.

The motor speech disorder of dysarthria is present in a substantial number of children with cerebral palsy (CP), leading to speech intelligibility deficits, which may negatively affect the children’s communication and quality of life. Few studies to date have examined strategies for increasing intelligibility in children with dysarthria, and most have focused on English speakers. Thus, questions regarding the effects of speech cueing strategies in speakers of other languages are under-explored. The purpose of this study was to determine if (Korean translations of) two cues, “speak with your big mouth,” targeting greater articulatory excursion, and “speak with your strong voice,” targeting greater vocal intensity, would elicit changes in speech acoustics and intelligibility in Korean-speaking children with dysarthria secondary to CP. Fifteen Korean-speaking children with dysarthria repeated word- and sentence-level stimuli in habitual, big mouth, and strong voice conditions. Intelligibility was assessed through the ease-of-understanding (EoU) ratings and percentage of words correctly transcribed (PWC) by 90 blinded listeners. Results indicated significantly greater vocal intensity and greater utterance duration in the cued conditions, demonstrating the children’s ability to vary their speech styles in response to the two cues. Furthermore, word-level EoU gains following both cues and sentence-level EoU gains following the strong voice cue suggest potential intelligibility benefits of the cues in this population. Gains in PWC were not statistically significant, and considerable variability in the children’s responses to the cues was noted overall. These findings contribute to the limited knowledge base for speech-language pathologists working with Korean speaking children. The variability in responses points to the importance of assessing each child’s stimulability to cues aimed to enhance intelligibility. Further clinical and theoretical considerations, including cross-linguistic implications, are discussed.

This clinical project sought to examine two different approaches to the treatment of functional articulatory disorders and to implement these two approaches in the actual management of two articulation disordered clients. The two approaches selected were the traditional auditory-stimulus method (Van Riper, 1972) and the sensory-motor approach (McDonald, 1964b) to testing and treatment. It was the intention of this project to compare the results of articulation intervention of the two methods.

It was the purpose of this experimental investigation: (1) to find some type of amplifying unit (a) that would be small enough to allow the parents of young children, and the child himsel, as he grew older, to carry from the home to the class room and back home again, (b) that had extremely high fidelity to insure the hard-of-hearing child the opportunity to learn tonal qualities, (c) that lacked static and high-frequency squeal which so often is found in the small portable hearing aids, (d) that had the volume capacity great enough to allow these hard-of-hearing children to use the small remnant of hearing sense that was left to them; (2) to ascertain whether or not pre-kindergarten children would use these instruments in a school situation; (3) if in this school situation the child would learn to speak; (4) whether the parents could be taught to use these instruments in the home situation; and (5) whether the combined stimulation at school and at home would develop speech and normal personality in the hard-of-hearing child. to flnd aom.e type of am!'ll.i ty:t.ng unit (a) the. t would ·be emn:tl enough to tJtllow the parents of young children, and the eh11d · h1:m• self 1 . as he grew older, to eeU'~ from tl'Ja home t-;o th-e olell!ls :room and hack home agai.n.1 (b) tbn.t ht1td extr~melJt high t"~.deltty to insure the hard..-of.,.henr:tng child tba oppo r~tuni ty to 1 em l"n t(m~_:J.__Q.i~!!-~-~~ 1 ~fJ~ j_~)_ __ ~r~~~ _1St o1red statS c and h1.gb .... fa~equen0mnant or hearing sense that was left ·to then'!) ( 2) to aacGrta:ln whethe:P or- not prt:h••kinde:r:•garten ch:tlclren would. uaa thtH'Ha 1nstru ... rnants :tn n school. s1. tuat1.on; ( 3) if il1 this school situation the child would l(~nrn to sp~tHr; (4) wl'H)ther the pnt'Em'b~$ cou;td be tl:lught to us& thet:~e 5.natruments :tn the home s:ttuationJ and ( l'5) whether th,e coml1i.tH:J!d st:tmulati<,)n r.t school and st bo:mo would develop f!:t)GE}ch and no:r~tal pe:t"sont'll:tty 1n the hard ... of..,.hanr•1.ng ch1.1d.

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published_or_final_version / Speech and Hearing Sciences / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

Thesis (MPhil) -- AUT University, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references. Also held in print (vi, 121 leaves ; 30 cm.) in the Archive at the City Campus (T 428.34 HUR)

Please read the abstract in the section 00front of this document / Dissertation (MA (AAC))--University of Pretoria, 2007. / Centre for Augmentative and Alternative Communication (CAAC) / unrestricted

This study has been designed to discover how the development of an integrating personality is influenced by defective speech; to ascertain whether or not personal growth is promoted by the correction of said defects, and to discover therapeutic measures if such are warranted.