The term working memory (WM) refers to a set of cognitive processes that allows for the temporary storage and manipulation of information. Neural correlates of the N- back task, a well-established WM measure used in neuroimaging, have been studied extensively in adults but less so in developmental populations. This thesis determines the effect of age on brain activations that mediate cognitive processes for remembering non- verbal/visual stimuli. Block-design fMRI was used to record activity in 84 subjects (6-35 years) during a visual-patterns 0- and 1-back task. Regions activated during the 1-back condition were largely common to all age groups, with adults displaying the largest extent of activations. Children and adolescents showed similar 0-back activations (distinct from 1-back) while adults engaged an analogous 1-back activation pattern during 0-back, suggesting that brain mechanisms underlying memory and attentional processes required for this task in children and adolescents are not yet mature and that strategy usage is still developing.

The term working memory (WM) refers to a set of cognitive processes that allows for the temporary storage and manipulation of information. Neural correlates of the N- back task, a well-established WM measure used in neuroimaging, have been studied extensively in adults but less so in developmental populations. This thesis determines the effect of age on brain activations that mediate cognitive processes for remembering non- verbal/visual stimuli. Block-design fMRI was used to record activity in 84 subjects (6-35 years) during a visual-patterns 0- and 1-back task. Regions activated during the 1-back condition were largely common to all age groups, with adults displaying the largest extent of activations. Children and adolescents showed similar 0-back activations (distinct from 1-back) while adults engaged an analogous 1-back activation pattern during 0-back, suggesting that brain mechanisms underlying memory and attentional processes required for this task in children and adolescents are not yet mature and that strategy usage is still developing.

The main purpose was to study if children with intellectual disability interact or participate differently with preschool staff and peers compared to their non-disabled peers and how preschool teachers experience interaction and participation for children with intellectual disability and children with typical development. The results from study I show that there are more similarities than differences between the groups. There are no differences between the groups neither in engagement nor in what kind of material the children use or in what setting they play. The results indicated that children with intellectual disability interacted in the same contexts as their peers. Significant differences were found, indicating that the children with intellectual disabilities communicate less and especially less with peers. Children with intellectual disability are more often close to a teacher than children with typical development. Teacher’s communication indicates that teachers communicate and initiate more often to children with intellectual disabilities. Results from study II showed that the main difference between the target child and the control child expressed from the teachers was in the area communication. Participation differed in structured and unstructured situations even if it is not significant. The child with intellectual disability was less involved in his/her live situation in unstructured situations. The results from Individual Plans showed that goals and methods about communication were more common as a goal than interaction even if the teachers expressed that interaction is the child’s main problem.

abstract: Children with dyslexia have difficulty learning to read. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether the use of simultaneous multisensory structured language (multisensory) instruction promoted better letter name and sound production, word reading, and word spelling for second grade children with typical development (TD; N=6) or with dyslexia (DYS; N=5) than structured language instruction alone. The use of non-English graphemes (letters) to represent two pretend languages were used to control for children’s lexical knowledge. A multiple baseline, multiple probe across subjects single-case design, paired with an alternating treatments design, was used to compare the efficacy of multisensory and structure language interventions. Participant’s graphed data was visually analyzed and individual Tau-U and weighted Tau-U effect sizes were calculated for the outcome variables: letter name production, letter sound production, word reading, and word spelling. Both interventions had an overall effect for participants with TD and DYS, though for individual participants intervention effects varied across outcome variables. However, the multisensory intervention did not provide a clear advantage over the structured intervention for participants with TD or DYS. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Speech and Hearing Science 2016

This study examined the relationship between emergent imitation skills and social communication skills in 15 to 18 month old infants, using a quantitative correlational research design. Imitation skills are an index of later social cognition and language development, and a critical mechanism in language learning for typically developing children. Social communication skills in this age predict later language skills. The relationship between imitation and social communication is poorly understood in infants. This study looked at the relationship between imitation and social communication at their emergence. This study included 30 typically developing infants, whose participation was volunteered by their parents. They were recruited through posters and word-of-mouth in communities in the Pacific Northwest. Infants’ imitation behaviors were measured using the Motor Imitation Scale (Stone, Ousley, & Littleford, 1997), and their social communication skills were measured using the Communication and Symbolic Behavior Scales- Developmental Profile (Wetherby & Prizant, 2002). This study used a naturalistic observation model so the one-hour play sessions took place in the infants' homes. Sessions were digitally recorded for later scoring and analysis. This study demonstrated a concurrent and predictive relationship between imitation and language understanding in this age group. The study suggests that imitation is an important variable in early language acquisition that needs further study, and needs to be addressed when assessing prelinguistic child development. The study suggests that imitation skills should be fostered early on and provides evidence-based methods for facilitating imitation and language development. / Graduate / 0525 / 0518 / 0620 / 0460 / lhanika@uvic.ca

<p>  </p> <p>Sleep is a critical component of early development, with over 8,000 hours spent asleep between a child's first and third birthday alone. Beginning in infancy, sleep is linked to several aspects of development, such as language, attention, and social communication. Thus, given its frequency and importance for infants and toddlers, sleep is among the most common topics raised by parents of typically and atypically developing children at well-child visits and beyond. The current dissertation includes three distinct, but integrated studies on sleep in early development. Specifically, study 1 addresses sleep in typically developing toddlers using videosomnography (an objective measure of sleep), study 2 addresses relations between sleep and attention in toddlers at low and high familial risk for ASD, and study 3 addresses prospective patterns of early sleep and development in children who later develop ASD. Overall, results from this dissertation highlight that sleep problems (e.g., night waking) can be expected even within well documented typical development. Findings from this dissertation have implications for sleep measurement in early childhood and suggest that using objective measures of sleep and developmental competence are critical for understanding normative sleep in typical and atypical development. </p>

To explore how children use dialect, and whether the dialectal language develops during growth might be of interest from a speech language pathologist’s point of view as the dialect could influence the child’s speech. Previous research is often based on older material and/or examines the speech of adults.  In the present study, everyday language in groups of south- eastern Swedish speaking children was investigated. The aim of the present study was to examine to what extent typically developed children of the ages of  5, 8 and 11 years use dialectal language. A further purpose was to discover which dialectal characteristics that were present in the different age groups, and how they differed. The children were video- and audiorecorded during group sessions in everyday settings. The collected material was transcribed according to principles of conversation analysis, and key portions were chosen for deeper analysis. The identified dialectal characteristics were diphthongal, distinctly open or closed vowels and regarding consonants retroflex flap [ɭ] and posterior /r/ were encountered. In prosody a final tonal raise in phrases was observed. Dialectal words and phrases and discourse markers were also documented.   The results of the present study showed that the children use dialectal language as early as by the age of 5, but that older children had a more distinguishable dialect. Throughout all age groups, the vowels were dialectally influenced. Most distinctive was a much closed /i/ with a diphthong, and characteristically open &lt;ä&gt; and &lt;ö&gt;. The characteristic final tonal raise in phrases was encountered in all age groups. Furthermore, a variation regarding dialectal use has been observed between children but also within the same child. Discourse markers were found primarily in the school-aged children, assumingly due to the increased desire of belonging to a group. The results of the present study may contribute to the ability to determine whether phonology, lexicon and/or grammar in a child is deviant or in fact reflected by the south-eastern Swedish characteristics. Also from a diagnostic perspective it might be of value to know when to expect hearing dialectal characteristics in the child’s speech.

L’étude de la Régulation Emotionnelle (RE) et du tempérament chez l’enfant d’âge scolaire est au cœur de ce travail de thèse. En raison du manque d’outils satisfaisants, un premier questionnaire a été développé pour évaluer les compétences de RE et une seconde échelle a été traduite pour permettre la caractérisation du tempérament. D’après les rapports parentaux, il semble qu’avec l’âge, l'enfant sollicite de moins en moins son parent lors de situations émotionnelles et devienne apte à user de stratégies de RE intrapersonnelle pour contrôler l'émotion négative ou positive. Ceci suggère que la RE est un ensemble de compétences se développant encore en fin d’enfance. Au contraire, une stabilité de l’expression du tempérament entre 7 et 10 ans est rapportée, donnée en accord avec les données de la littérature. Enfin, l’étude de l’expression de la RE et du tempérament a été initiée chez l’enfant porteur d’un Trouble du Spectre Autistique (TSA). Selon les rapports parentaux, les enfants porteurs d’un TSA sont décrits comme usant moins de la RE interpersonnelle et comme présentant plus de difficultés de contrôle des émotions fortes (A-RE) que les enfants typiques. En outre, l’analyse intragroupe fait émerger 2 profils de RE, profils divergeant sur le plan de la RE intrapersonnelle et de l’A-RE. En couplant ces profils de RE aux 3 profils de tempérament isolés, il semble que la dimension tempéramentale contrôle volontaire soit associée aux difficultés de contrôle de l’émotion forte. Ces résultats ont une portée théorique et pratique intéressante car jusque-là les difficultés émotionnelles rencontrées chez l’enfant porteur d’un TSA n’ont jamais été évoqué en termes de tempérament. / At the heart of this thesis is the study of the expression of Emotion Regulation (ER) and temperament during middle childhood. Unfortunately, few satisfactory scales are available in French. Thus, a first questionnaire has been developed for assessing skills of ER and a second scale has been translated to provide a characterization of temperament in children. Parental reports indicate decreased use of interpersonal ER, which suggests that with age, children learn to regulate their emotions, and to use intrapersonal strategies in order to cope with positive as well as negative emotions. On the contrary, expression of temperament appears to be stable during middle childhood, and these results are in agreement with literature. Finally, in a pilot research, we have compared the expression of ER and temperament of 8 boys with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) matched on chronological age with 8 boys with typical development. According to parental reports, children with ASD use less interpersonal ER and present more difficulties to regulate intense emotions (A-RE) in comparison to typical children. Intragroup analysis revealed two patterns of ER in children with ASD. These patterns differ precisely in regards to the intrapersonal ER and A-ER. Association between profiles of ER and different profiles of temperament highlight that temperamental dimension of effortful control is linked to the level of A-ER. As until now the emotional difficulties frequently encountered/reported in children with ASD have never been mentioned in terms of temperament, the results of this thesis present new innovative theoretical and practical perspectives.

Les paradigmes expérimentaux de l'initiation de la marche (IM) et du rattrapage de l'équilibre (RE) consécutif à une chute-avant ont été choisis pour identifier les adaptations motrices éventuelles chez les enfants souffrant de lésions cérébrales (PC) bilatérales et unilatérales vs. les enfants avec un développement normal (DN). Les enfants PC et DN étaient âgés entre 5 et 16 ans. Les enfants PC avaient une marche autonome sans aide technique. Les résultats montraient que, dans l'IM, les différents groupes d'enfants présentent des patterns biomécaniques et d'activités EMG comparables lorsque l'appui est sain. Plus particulièrement, la présence d'un freinage de la chute pendant la phase pendulaire, qui est l'indice qui caractérise la maturation du processus de la marche, chez les plus jeunes PC indique l'absence de retard. Lorsque l'appui est sur le côté lésé, le freinage est absent voire faible. Cette absence de freinage peut être imputée à la modification de l'appui en équin. De même, les tracés biomécaniques et EMG dans RE montraient des patterns comparables entre les différents groupes d'enfants. Toutefois une différence remarquable peut être distinguée par rapport à l'activité EMG des muscles fléchisseurs plantaires et dorsaux des adultes. Chez les adultes, la chute provoque une réponse précoce bilatérale des Soleus accompagnée parallèlement d'une activité de faible amplitude des TA. Chez les enfants, les TA montraient une importante bouffée EMG en même temps que la bouffée du Soleus. La suppression de cette bouffée précoce lorsque la chute est rapidement arrêtée annihilant l'exécution du pas suggère que les enfants DN et PC déclencheraient en même temps la réaction à la chute et le programme d'initiation du pas. Si les enfants PC pouvaient réalisés les deux tâches motrices, exécution du pas normal et exécution du pas provoqué, c'est semble-t-il grâce à la toxine botulique qui avait permis à l'enfant PC de se mettre debout libre, apprendre à contrôler son équilibre postural et la marche. / Experimental paradigms of gait initiation (GI) and balance recovery (BR) following a forward-fall were chosen to study motor adaptation in cerebral palsy (CP) children as compared to typical development children (TD). Children age ranged between 5 and 16 y.o. PC children walked independently. Results in GI showed that biomechanical and EMG pattern are comparable between the different groups when stance foot was on sound side. More particularly, the presence of fall braking during swing phase, which is a maturation index of gait process, in young CP indicates that there is no delay. When stance foot is on affected side, fall braking is absent that can be explained by equines foot. In BR, biomechanical and EMG traces are comparable between the different groups. However, if compare to adults, there is a striking difference in the EMG patterns. In adults, the fall elicited a bilateral burst of EMG in Soleus muscle, in parallel Tibialis anterior (TA) showed concomitant EMG activity but with lower amplitude. In children, TA showed a burst of EMG activity in parallel to SOL. This TA EMG burst was suppressed whether the fall was arrested annihilating the stepping. This result suggests that children trigger at the time the fall reaction program and the stepping program. If CP children can carry out both motor tasks, normal stepping and provoked stepping, this was thanks to use of botulinum toxin which help children standing up. Then, the mechanism of balance control can operate, and supporting gait acquisition.

No description available.