Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 1984. / Vita. Bibliography: leaves [73]-82.

People with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) have difficulty empathizing with others, contributing to deficits in social interaction and communication. The degree of difficulty empathizing may be related to the level of impairment associated with the ASD. Little is known about the early development of empathy prior to ASD diagnosis. A novel way of studying the early development of ASDs is to study the development of younger siblings of children with ASDs, who are at an increased genetic risk for these disorders, and compare them to children with typically developing older siblings. The current study examined how empathic responding and cooperation, a measure of prosocial functioning, at 24 and 30 months of age differed between children who later received a diagnosis of autism or pervasive developmental disorder-not otherwise specified, and those who did not. Overall, children engaged in more empathic responding at 30 months than at 24 months. As expected, children later diagnosed with autism engaged in less empathic responding than children with no diagnosis. Additionally, lower empathic responding at 24 months predicted higher autism symptomatology at 30 months. In terms of cooperation, children tended to engage in less noncompliant behavior at 30 months than at 24 months. However, no age differences were found for compliant behavior. Contrary to expectations, there were no diagnostic group differences in cooperative behavior nor was there a relation between empathic responding and cooperation. This was one of the first studies to investigate empathic responding in young children prior to diagnosis with an ASD. Results show that empathy deficits are present from an early age, and may be an important predictor for later diagnosis. Implications for these findings and future directions are discussed.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2006. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Although recent data suggest the existence of anti-fat attitudes, fear of fatness, and maladaptive eating attitudes among Indian women, few researchers have examined the cross-cultural validity of their instruments before assessing Indian samples. The present study assessed the measurement equivalence of three related measures, the Anti-Fat Attitudes Scale, the Goldfarb Fear of Fat Scale, and the Eating Attitudes Test-26, and tested the invariance of latent means among Indian (n = 226) and Euro-American (n = 211) female college students. Multi-group confirmatory factor analyses using maximum likelihood estimation with robust standard errors demonstrated reasonable measurement equivalence of the instruments across Indian and Euro-American groups. Confidence interval comparisons of latent means suggested that the Indians and Euro-Americans did not differ significantly in levels of fear of fatness or eating attitudes, but there were some group differences in anti-fat attitudes. Structural equation modeling suggested that fear of fatness and anti-fat attitudes predict about 66% of the variance in Indian eating attitudes; however, these results must be interpreted cautiously due to a poorly fitting measurement model. Results of multiple regression analyses suggested that the eating attitudes of the Indian respondents were not significantly predicted by theirsocioeconomic status or degree of Westernization. In conclusion, these data suggest that there are some similarities, but also some important differences, in the eating-related attitudes and behaviors of Euro-American and Indian women.

Mitochondrial deficiencies are present in limb skeletal muscle fibers throughout normal aging and can increase with accumulated exposure to reactive oxide species. Exogenous sources of reactive oxide species include cigarette smoke and other environmental toxins. Intrinsic laryngeal muscles are directly exposed to inhaled toxins which may increase the percentage of cytochrome c oxidase deficient fibers over time. Serial sections of posterior cricoarytenoid and control strap muscle were harvested post laryngectomy from 10 males age 54-78 years old. Cytochrome c oxidase, succinate dehydrogenase, and modified Gomori trichrome stains were used to determine the percentage of type I fibers with cytochrome c oxidase deficiency. Staining with myosin antibodies was used to determine fiber type. The posterior cricoarytenoid muscle contained a significantly higher percentage of type I fibers with cytochrome c oxidase deficiency (p=.002, t = 4.939) compared to the control strap muscle. The percentage of cytochrome c oxidase deficient fibers was also significantly correlated (r = +.851; p < .01) with age in posterior cricoarytenoid muscle. The percentage of type I fibers with cytochrome c oxidase deficiency increases with age in the posterior cricoarytenoid muscle and may be due to the accumulated exposure to reactive oxide species over time.

The role of exercise in vocal fold wound healing has been overlooked. Data from numerous other systems suggest a positive role of tissue mobilization to facilitate optimal wound healing and biomechanically superior tissue. The current study sought to investigate the potential role of mechanical signaling to attenuate the inflammatory and alter the synthetic properties of fibroblasts cultured from the vocal folds. Vocal fold fibroblasts were subjected to one of four conditions: no treatment, IL-1â alone, mechanical stress alone, or mechanical stress plus IL-1â. Results suggest that mechanical stress may limit the inflammatory phenotype of vocal fold fibroblasts in the short-term (4 hours), but not in the long-term (24 hours). In fact, 24 hours of mechanical stress may actually increase the inflammatory response. In addition, neither IL-1â nor mechanical stress had an effect on vocal fold fibroblast synthesis of extracellular matrix proteins. As a potential explanation for the current findings, it is hypothesized that the vocal folds may be more resilient to mechanical stress given the inherently stressful environment associated with phonation.

An important purpose of hearing is to aid communication. Because hearing-in-noise is of primary importance to individuals who seek remediation for hearing impairment, it has been the primary objective of advances in technology. Directional microphone technology is the most promising way to address this problem. Another important role of hearing is localization, allowing one to sense ones environment and feel safe and secure. The properties of the listening environment that are altered with directional microphone technology have the potential to significantly impair localization ability. The purpose of this investigation was to determine the impact of listening with directional microphone technology on individuals self-perceived level of localization disability and concurrent handicap. Participants included 57 unaided subjects, later randomly assigned to participate in one of three aided groups of 19 individuals each, who used omni-directional microphone only amplification, directional microphone only amplification, or toggle-switch equipped hearing aids that allowed user discretion over the directional microphone properties of the instruments. Comparisons were made between the unaided group responses and those of the subjects after having worn amplification for three months. Additionally, comparisons between the directional microphone only group responses and each of the other two aided groups responses were made. No significant differences were found. Hearing aids with omni-directional microphones, directional-only microphones, and those that are equipped with a toggle-switch, neither increased nor decreased the self-perceived level of ability to tell the location of sound or the level of withdrawal from situations where localization ability was a factor. Concurrently, directional-microphone only technology did not significantly worsen or improve these factors as compared to the other two microphone configurations. Future research should include objective measures of localization ability using the same paradigm employed herein. If the use of directional microphone technology has an objective impact on localization, clinicians might be advised to counsel their patients to be careful moving in their environment even though they do not perceive a problem with localization. If ultimately no significant differences in either objective or subjective measures are found, then concern over decreases in quality of life and safety with directional microphone use need no longer be considered.

This study examined the hypothesis that cognitive resources may be involved in swallowing. The approach involved a dual-task, reaction time (RT) paradigm with 10 healthy, non-impaired (NI) control participants and 10 participants in early to middle stages of Parkinsons disease (PD). First, baseline measures were obtained for durations of anticipatory phase and oropharyngeal phase during swallowing and RTs to non-word, auditory stimuli. Next, a dual-task was introduced requiring participants to swallow 5 ml of water from a cup while listening for a target non-word presented auditorily during anticipatory or oropharyngeal phases. Target stimuli were randomized across 19 baseline/single-task and 19 dual-task trials. For the single-task data, repeated measures analyses of variance were used to assess differences in (a) durations of the anticipatory phase across trials within and between participant groups; (b) durations of the oropharyngeal phase across trials within and between participant groups; and (c) durations of reaction times across trials within and between groups. For the dual-task data, analyses of variance were used to assess differences in (a) durations of the anticipatory phase between baseline/single-task and dual-task conditions; (b) durations of the oropharyngeal phase between baseline/single-task and dual-task conditions; and (c) durations of reaction times between baseline/single-task and dual-task conditions for each of the two swallowing phases. Results showed slowed swallowing and RTs in participants with PD compared to controls in both anticipatory and oropharyngeal phases of swallowing. This effect was largely carried by participants in more severe, mid-stage disease as compared to early disease. The anticipatory phase was more affected than the oropharyngeal phase, suggesting that cognitive demands may be greater for that phase. Swallowing durations were similar for NIs and participants in early stage PD, underscoring the strength and persistent nature of swallowing.

Abstract The present study sought (1) to determine if any evidence could be found of an influence of clinical language on self-efficacy for voice in adults with voice problems; and (2) to determine the number of subjects that would be required to undertake future large-scale study around this question, if warranted, based on effect sizes determined in the present investigation. The study¡¦s relevance has to do with prior concerns raised in the literature that common clinical language in voice care¡Xspecifically language indicating vocal ¡§abuse and misuse¡¨ as causal factors in selected voice disorders--has potential to harm self-efficacy for voice, which in turn may compromise patient compliance with treatment and thus clinical outcome (Verdolini, 1999). Fourteen teachers with self-reported voice disorders of unknown etiology were recruited as participants. Subjects were randomly assigned to one of two 15-min standardized, videotaped educational exposures by an unbiased clinician who was unaware of the experimental questions. One exposure described the origins of common voice problems in teachers in terms of vocal ¡§abuse/misuse¡¨ (N=7). The other exposure described the problems in terms of ¡§phonotraumatic behaviors and muscular tension¡¨ (N=7). Before and immediately after exposures, subjects completed a visual analogue scale Voice Self-Efficacy Questionnaire that was specially designed for the study, that assessed situation-neutral self-efficacy for voice. Psychometric evaluation of the tool indicated strong intra-rater and test-retest reliability (r d. 99; r d .78 respectively). The groups were also found to have no significant differences between them at the pre-test level, thus showing that amount of change on the post-test Voice Self-Efficacy Questionnaire were not influenced by individual subject differences on the pre-test. More conceptually interesting, binomial tests indicated that the majority of responses to self-efficacy questions reliably increased pre- to post exposure in the ¡§phonotrauma/muscle tension¡¨ (20/28 responses; p < .05), whereas no reliable change in scores was seen in the ¡§abuse/misuse¡¨ group (11/28 responses increased; non-significant). A Chi-Square test was conducted, and as with the binomial test, found a statistical difference between the 11 increased/28 possible self-efficacy responses of the ¡§abuse/misuse¡¨ group, and the 20/28 increased self-efficacy responses of the ¡§phonotrauma¡¨ group to the < .05 level. Results provide preliminary support for the hypothesis that clinical exposure to ¡§abuse/misuse¡¨ language may harm patients¡¦ self-efficacy for voice, not necessarily by decreasing pre-exposure self-efficacy but by compromising increases in self-efficacy that may normally be expected with patient education, as reported for other domains. The issue of self-efficacy for voice should be pursued in larger-scale studies in other laboratories. Effect sizes based on the present data indicated that at least 20 subjects per group (N=40 total) would be required to assess the effects of the noted terminology on voice-related self-efficacy shifts parametrically, using a similar experimental design.

The purpose of the present study was to determine if objective and/or subjective differences between analog and digital hearing aids exist when blinding is utilized in the protocol and circuitry is controlled. Ten normal hearing and seven hearing impaired subjects were monaurally fitted with analog and digital hearing aids. Probe microphone measures were obtained at the plane of the tympanic membrane at two output levels (40 dB SPL and 70 dB SPL). Listener performance in quiet was evaluated via word recognition testing, listener performance in noise was evaluated via the Hearing in Noise Test, and listener preference was evaluated via a questionnaire. Results indicated similar performance for all objective and subjective tasks for both hearing aids with the exception of better performance in quiet at the 40 dB SPL presentation level with the analog hearing aid for the hearing impaired group. These results indicate that listeners performed as well or significantly better with the analog hearing aid than with the digital hearing aid. Furthermore, future investigation is recommended to evaluate the effectiveness of some features available on digital hearing aids that are not available on analog hearing aids, such as expansion and noise reduction.