This study examines the effects of two teaching procedures and two testing procedures (“Skip” and “Guess”) on acquisition, retention and generalization of learning. Three typically developing females between the ages of 8 and 11 learned the 24 lower case letters of the Greek alphabet. Half of the letters were taught with the “Skip” procedure and the other half with the “Guess” procedure. The “Skip” procedure produced faster and more efficient learning than the “Guess” procedure. The “Skip” procedure also resulted in better initial retention (4 weeks), but this effect disappeared in subsequent retention tests. The training conditions did not have differential effects on generalization tests across learning channels, except for the Free/Say channel.

This study was done to validate a widely used parent questionnaire that assesses sleep problems in children ages 4‑10. To date, no Spanish‑language sleep questionnaire is available for the Spanish‑speaking population. Research has found that sleep problems affect both typically developing children and children with developmental disabilities, potentially detracting from their quality of life. Spanish is the second most frequently spoken language in the United States, so it is of high importance to make available a Spanish‑language sleep questionnaire. The Children’s Sleep Habits Questionnaire (CSHQ) was chosen to be translated. The norming data for validation of the CSHQ‑S included 151 children from the community sample and 30 children from the clinical sample. A confirmatory factor analysis failed to replicate the purported internal structure of the English‑language CSHQ. Subsequent exploratory factor analysis yielded a unique 5‑factor solution which generally met criteria of reliability and validity. Our results show that children with disabilities experience more sleep problems than typically developing children. The CSHQ‑S can be considered to be a good Spanish‑language sleep measure in typically developing children and children with disabilities.

iii Abstract Sibling relationships are amongst the most influential relationships in one’s life. Bringing autism spectrum disorder (ASD) into these interactional dynamics has a marked influence on these relationships for both the sibling with ASD and the typically developing siblings. The main aim of this study was to investigate how typically developing adolescents describe their present attitudes towards their sibling with ASD, compared to their attitudes when they were younger. Thirty typically developing adolescents who have siblings with ASD were selected to complete the survey instrument, namely the Modified Lifespan Sibling Relationship Scale (MLSRS). The survey instrument operated on the conceptualisation of attitudes as consisting of three components: affective, cognitive and behavioural. The results indicated that the majority of adolescents have very strong positive feelings towards their sibling (affective component), both at the time of the research and when they were younger. Their beliefs about their siblings and their relationship with them (cognitive component) have become more positive as they became older. Their actual interaction (behavioural component) was, however, found to be significantly lower than their feelings towards their siblings (both as adolescents and as younger children) and their beliefs about their relationships as adolescents. This study highlighted the need for children who develop typically to be taught how to interact effectively with their sibling with ASD and the need for siblings to be provided with age appropriate information about their sibling’s disorder. The results also indicate that although most of the children seemed to be coping well with the extra demands placed on them they would nevertheless still be able to benefit from support groups for siblings of children with ASD. / Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2014. / gm2014 / Centre for Augmentative and Alternative Communication (CAAC) / unrestricted

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Background: Ambulation is critical to a child’s participation, development of selfconcept, and quality of life. Children with cerebral palsy (CP) frequently exhibit limitation in walking proficiency which has been identified as the primary physical disability. Traditional rehabilitative treatment techniques to improve ambulation for children with CP reveal inconsistent results. Driven gait orthosis (DGO) training is a novel approach focusing on motor learning principles that foster cortical neural plasticity. Objective: The objectives are to determine if: (i) the lower extremity muscle activation patterns of children with CP are similar to age-matched TD children in overground (OG) walking, (ii) DGO training replicates muscle activation patterns in OG ambulation in TD children, (iii) the lower extremity muscle activation patterns in OG walking of children with CP are similar to their muscle activation patterns with DGO assistance, and (iv) DGO training promotes unimpaired muscle activation patterns in children with CP. Methods: Muscle activity patterns of the rectus femoris, semitendinosus, gluteus maximus and gluteus medius were recorded in the OG and DGO walking conditions of children with CP and age-matched TD. The gait cycles were identified and the data was averaged to produce final average gait cycle time normalized values. Results: In comparing the variability of the muscle activation patterns within the subject groups, CP DGO walking was considerably lower than CP OG. In comparing the muscle activation patterns in each condition, consistent differences (p < .05) were noted in terminal stance, pre-swing and initial swing phases of gait with the DGO condition consistently revealing greater muscle unit recruitment. Conclusion: The results indicate that training in the DGO provided the ability to practice with measurably repetitive movement as evidenced by decreased variability. Consistent differences were noted in muscle activation patterns in the terminal stance, pre-swing and initial swing phases of gait when most of these muscles are primarily inactive. The alteration in ground reaction force within the DGO environment may play a role in this variance. With the goal of normalizing gait, it is important that the effect of these parameters on ground reaction forces be considered in the use of DGO rehabilitation.

No description available.

Pas de résumé / The thesis investigated the development of children’s global/local processing hierarchical patterns introduced by Navon (1977). The objectives were to understand more comprehensively the developmental characteristics of children’s perception through their global and local processing of hierarchical patterns, by considering the effects of age, stimuli properties, duration of exposure to the stimuli and gender in a perceptual task and a drawing task. These effects were tested in 3 different populations: typically developing children, children with mental retardation and early blind children. The results revealed that typically developing children attended to both the local and global level of processing but these modes of spatial information processing operated independently. In a first step, children before 4 years of age showed dominance of local processing and then a more global processing developed at 4 years of age, and at 5 years of age integrated responses began to emerge. Early blind children showed similar developmental characteristics, although there was a protracted period of local processing dominance. Indeed, these children mainly produced local responses at ages of between 6 and 10 years, and then developed more global responses at 11-12 years and continued to integrate the two levels of analysis at later ages. On the other hand, global dominance was shown in children with mental retardation and their development was affected more by mental age than by chronological age. Moreover, their responses were shown to be sensitive to the fact that meaningful object could be located at the local level, enhancing local processing in this case. These results need further confirmations as the studies of global/local processing in atypical children are not numerous. In particular, the effect of duration of exposure to the stimuli should be further analyzed, because this factor did not seem to have a great effect in our experiments while it seemed more powerful in other studies carried out with adults. Replication of the study with children with mental retardation appears also important to plan for future work, because we can have some doubt relatively the absence of modification through ages of the way these children perceive hierarchical patterns. Finally, defining more precisely what may underlie the gender differences seems also worth to explore since gender did not show a major effect in our results.

Sibling relationships and the interaction within these relationships play a central role in children’s general development and will therefore impact on functional outcomes of children with severe speech and language disabilities. Siblings of children with disabilities have often felt excluded from family interactions, possibly causing negative attitudes towards participation with their siblings, in turn impacting negatively on the functional outcomes of their siblings with disabilities. The main aim of this research is to determine the attitudes of typically-developing children towards participation with their younger siblings with severe speech and language disabilities in four everyday life situations, namely: play (major life areas), communication, activities of daily living as part of domestic life and interpersonal relationships (time and responsibility issues). Twenty-seven older, typically-developing siblings of children with severe speech and language disabilities were selected to complete the measuring instrument (SAS). The results indicated that the participants held the most positive attitudes towards participation in play (major life areas) but that they held less positive attitudes towards communication participation and that they were least positive about participation in interpersonal relationships (time and responsibility issues). This study succeeded in documenting attitudes of siblings towards participating in four everyday life situations with their younger sibling. It is envisaged that these results will provide tentative guidelines for how activity-based interventions can best be structured to support both the child with a disability and their sibling. Copyright / Dissertation (Master of Arts)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Centre for Augmentative and Alternative Communication (CAAC) / unrestricted

The thesis investigated the development of children's global/local processing hierarchical patterns introduced by Navon (1977). The objectives were to understand more comprehensively the developmental characteristics of children's perception through their global and local processing of hierarchical patterns, by considering the effects of age, stimuli properties, duration of exposure to the stimuli and gender in a perceptual task and a drawing task. These effects were tested in 3 different populations: typically developing children, children with mental retardation and early blind children. The results revealed that typically developing children attended to both the local and global level of processing but these modes of spatial information processing operated independently. In a first step, children before 4 years of age showed dominance of local processing and then a more global processing developed at 4 years of age, and at 5 years of age integrated responses began to emerge. Early blind children showed similar developmental characteristics, although there was a protracted period of local processing dominance. Indeed, these children mainly produced local responses at ages of between 6 and 10 years, and then developed more global responses at 11-12 years and continued to integrate the two levels of analysis at later ages. On the other hand, global dominance was shown in children with mental retardation and their development was affected more by mental age than by chronological age. Moreover, their responses were shown to be sensitive to the fact that meaningful object could be located at the local level, enhancing local processing in this case. These results need further confirmations as the studies of global/local processing in atypical children are not numerous. In particular, the effect of duration of exposure to the stimuli should be further analyzed, because this factor did not seem to have a great effect in our experiments while it seemed more powerful in other studies carried out with adults. Replication of the study with children with mental retardation appears also important to plan for future work, because we can have some doubt relatively the absence of modification through ages of the way these children perceive hierarchical patterns. Finally, defining more precisely what may underlie the gender differences seems also worth to explore since gender did not show a major effect in our results.

Étant donné que le bilinguisme et le multilinguisme sont la norme plutôt que l’exception, plusieurs enfants, y inclus plusieurs enfants ayant un trouble du spectre de l’autisme (TSA) sont élevés dans des contextes bilingues. Cependant, il y a actuellement peu de recherche examinant le développement langagier d’enfants ayant été exposés à deux langues, de la petite enfance à l’âge scolaire. Cette thèse a pour objectif d’examiner l’influence du bilinguisme sur le développement d’habiletés langagières d’enfants bilingues ayant un développement neurotypique à l’âge scolaire, ainsi que chez leurs pairs ayant un TSA. Cet objectif est atteint par l’entremise de trois manuscrits. Le premier manuscrit est une revue de la littérature dans le cadre de laquelle nous avons examiné le développement langagier d’enfants bilingues ayant un DN d’enfants ayant d’autres troubles de développement et finalement d’enfants ayant un TSA. Cette revue révéla que, tout comme leurs pairs ayant un DN, les enfants ayant un TSA peuvent devenir des locuteurs bilingues, et que le bilinguisme n’est pas néfaste à leur développement langagier. Cependant, certaines limites dans la littérature existante ont aussi été révélées. Dans un premier temps, la majorité des études publiées ont examiné les habiletés langagières d’enfants bilingues d’âge préscolaire. Toutefois, peu d’études ont examiné leur développement langagier une fois qu’ils atteignent l’âge scolaire, et ce, tant chez les enfants ayant un DN que chez les enfants ayant un TSA. Par ailleurs, peu d’études ont comparé les capacités langagières d’enfants ayant un TSA à celles de leurs pairs bilingues ayant un DN et aucune étude n’a comparé leurs capacités langagières à celles de leurs pairs unilingues ayant un DN. Les résultats qui découlent de cette revue ont menés à deux études expérimentales examinant l’influence du bilinguisme sur le développement langagier chez les enfants d’âge scolaire ayant un DN, ainsi que chez leurs pairs ayant un TSA. Notre revue de littérature suggère que l’exposition langagière pourrait jouer un rôle déterminant vis-à-vis les capacités langagières d’enfants bilingues. Le second manuscrit a donc comme objectif d’examiner la relation entre le développement langagier d’enfants étant des bilingues simultanés (exposés à leurs deux langues avant l’âge de trois ans) d’âge scolaire, et la quantité d’exposition langagière reçue dans chacune de leurs langues (le français et l’anglais). Globalement, nos résultats ont démontré une interaction entre la quantité d’exposition à l’anglais et la performance sur certaines mesures de langage expressif, mais pas avec les mesures de langage réceptif en anglais. En français, aucune interaction entre la quantité d’exposition au français et les performances sur les différentes mesures langagières n’a été trouvée. Ces différences sont potentiellement dues à des différences dans les montants d’exposition au français et à l’anglais, mais d’autres explications sont aussi discutées. De plus, les résultats suggèrent qu’en ayant approximativement 20% de leur exposition à une langue, ces enfants bilingues peuvent obtenir des scores dans la tranche moyenne sur toutes les mesures langagières. Par ailleurs, les enfants qui se servent de leurs deux langues tous les jours semblent nécessiter un moins grand pourcentage d’exposition pour développer des capacités langagières dans la moyenne. Ces résultats pourraient être expliqués par le transfert positif et une amélioration des capacités métalinguistiques plus généralement. Ce type d’amélioration pourrait permettre aux enfants qui se servent de leurs deux langues tous les jours de développer de meilleures capacités d’acquisition langagière. Les résultats de la revue de littérature ont aussi démontré que peu est connu en ce qui a trait aux capacités langagières d’enfants bilingues ayant un TSA lorsqu’ils atteignent l’âge scolaire. Conséquemment, pour le troisième manuscrit j’ai complété une étude pilote ayant comme objectif d’examiner si trois enfants bilingues simultanés d’âge scolaire et ayant un TSA (sans trouble de langage ou de déficiences intellectuelles) pouvaient atteindre des niveaux d’habiletés langagières semblables à celles de leurs pairs unilingues ayant un TSA. J’ai aussi cherché à savoir si ces trois enfants bilingues ayant un TSA pouvaient atteindre des seuils langagiers semblables à ceux de 19 pairs bilingues et 12 pairs unilingues ayant tous un DN. Les résultats ont démontré que ces bilingues simultanés ayant un TSA ont eu des performances semblables à celles de leurs pairs unilingues ayant un TSA sur des mesures langagières normées. Ils ont aussi eu des performances semblables à celles de leurs pairs bilingues et unilingues ayant un DN. L’ensemble de ces résultats démontrent que les enfants bilingues simultanés d’âge scolaire avec et sans TSA peuvent atteindre des niveaux d’habiletés langagières semblables à ceux de leurs pairs unilingues, du moins, dans une de leurs langues, sinon dans les deux. Bien que les bilingues ne sont pas deux unilingues en une seule personne, les résultats de nos recherches concordent avec ceux de recherches antécédentes et démontrent que le bilinguisme n’est pas néfaste pour le développement langagier oral d’enfants d’âge scolaire ayant un DN ou ayant un TSA. / Since bilingualism and multilingualism are the norm rather than the exception, many children, including children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), live in bilingual or minority-language households. However, little research has examined the language development of school-aged children who have been exposed to two languages since early childhood, and fewer still have examined bilingual school-aged children with ASD. In this thesis, I examine the influence of bilingualism on language development in both school-aged ND children and in their peers with ASD. This objective will be achieved through the three manuscripts making up this thesis. For the first manuscript, we completed a review of the literature in which we examined the language development of ND bilingual children, of bilingual children with various developmental disorders, and of bilingual children with ASD. This review revealed that, as with neurotypically developing (ND) children, children with ASD can become bilingual speakers, and that bilingualism is not detrimental to their language development. Our review also revealed some of the limits of the existing literature. First, the majority of existing studies had examined bilingual language development in preschool-aged children with and without ASD, but had not examined the language development of these bilingual children once they reached school age. Second, few studies had compared the language abilities of bilingual children with ASD to those of their ND bilingual peers, and at time of publication, none had compared them to those of ND monolingual children. The results from this review lead to two studies examining the influence of bilingualism on language development in school-aged ND children and in children with ASD. Our review of the literature suggested that language exposure may play an important role in determining bilingual children’s language ability. However, little was known about its influence in school-aged children. Therefore, for the second manuscript, I examined whether there was a relationship between language development and the amount of language exposure that ND simultaneous bilinguals (i.e. children having been exposed to both languages before the age of three years) received in each of their languages (French and English). I found a relationship between lifetime exposure to English and performances on some English-language expressive language measure, but not on receptive language measures. In French, no relationship between the amount of exposure to French and performances on any of the French-language measures was found. These differences in findings could be due to differences in language exposure ranges across both languages but other potential explanations are also discussed. Findings also show that when receiving 20% of their exposure to a language, most children were able to obtain scores within the average range on the language measures. Moreover, children who were exposed to both of their languages on a daily basis often had stronger performances on language measures than children who did not receive daily exposure to both of their languages. I hypothesized that positive transfer and improved metalinguistic abilities more generally may have contributed to improved language learning abilities in children who used both of their languages on a daily basis. Findings from the literature review also revealed that little was known about the language abilities of bilingual children with ASD once they reached school-age. With that in mind, the third manuscript reports on a pilot study that examined whether three simultaneous bilingual school-aged children with ASD (without a comorbid language disorder or an intellectual disability) could achieve language levels similar to those of their two French-monolingual peers with ASD. I also explored whether these bilingual children with ASD could reach language proficiency levels similar to those of their 19 ND simultaneous bilingual peers, in both of their languages (French and English), and whether they had similar abilities to those of their 12 ND French-monolingual peers. I found that the simultaneous bilingual children with ASD performed similarly on standardized language measures to their two monolingual peers with ASD, in both of their languages. They also had similar performances to those of their ND bilingual peers, as well as to those of their ND monolingual peers. Overall, these findings reveal that ND school-aged simultaneous bilinguals and their simultaneous bilingual peers with ASD (without a language disorder or intellectual disability) can achieve language proficiency levels similar to those of their monolingual peers, in at least one, if not both of their languages. While bilingual children are not two monolinguals within one child, our findings are similar to previous findings and show that bilingualism does not appear to impede the language development of school-aged ND bilingual children and bilingual children with ASD.