Custom-designed hearing instruments comprise the majority of those dispensed in the United States today. Because of their custom nature, there has been no means of evaluating them until they have been completed. There would be advantages to evaluating custom instruments prior to their completion. This study investigates a means of evaluating custom instruments prior to their final assembly into the customized shell. This is done by having the subject listen to the circuitry of the instrument while it is still mounted on the faceplate, which is accomplished by coupling the faceplate assembly to the subject's ear with foam earplug. To determine if the faceplate assembly, when coupled to the subject's ear, is a facsimile of the completed instrument, the insertion gain of the faceplate assembly was compared to the insertion gain of the completed instrument. Real ear measurements were obtained for both conditions (faceplate assembly vs. custom instrument) on twelve subjects. Once insertion gain was measured, the faceplate assemblies were then converted into custom instruments and insertion gain remeasured. A two-way Analysis of Variance test revealed no significant difference between the two test conditions at five representative test frequencies. A tolerance template, as specified by ANSI S3.22 1982, was used as a second criterion for similarity between two conditions. The tolerance template was superimposed over the insertion gain curves of the twelve faceplate assembly conditions to determine if the insertion gain curves of the completed instrument fell within acceptable variances. None of the insertion gain curves for the completed instruments fell completely within the tolerances allowed by the template. Based on this criterion, it was concluded there was a significant difference between the insertion gain of the two conditions and therefore the faceplate assembly was not a facsimile of the completed instrument, where insertion gain was concerned. However, from a subjective standpoint the faceplate assembly might still have some utility in the fitting of the custom in-the-ear hearing instruments. For example, it could be used to allow potential hearing aid wearers to experience different technologies during the preselection phase of the fitting process.

Predicting language outcomes in children who at age two are "late talkers" is a concern of Speech Language Pathologists. Currently, there is no conclusive data allowing specialists to predict which children will outgrow their delays and which children will not. The purpose of the present study is to analyze the effect of a receptive language delay on the outcome of the slow expressive language delayed child, and determine whether or not it is a viable predictor of poor outcomes. The subject information used in this project was compiled from the data collected and reported by Paul (1991) during the Portland Language Development Project (PLDP). Children in the PLDP first participated in the longitudinal study between the ages of twenty to thirtyfour months. They were categorized as being slow in expressive language development if they produced fewer that fifty intelligible words during this age range. They were then subgrouped into an expressive-receptive delayed group if they scored more than one standard deviation below the mean on the Reynell Developmental Language Scales. Of the twenty-five subjects with complete data over the five years of the study, nineteen were considered to be solely expressively delayed, while the remaining six were classified as having both an expressive and a receptive language delay. Lee's Developmental Sentence Scoring (DSS) (1974) was used to track the subject's expressive language abilities to the age of seven. DSS scores were analyzed yearly, using the Mann-Whitney nonparametric statistical test. This would determine whether the subjects considered to be both expressively and receptively delayed were exhibiting more difficulties in their expressive language abilities than those subjects with expressive delays alone. The results of the study indicated that significant differences did not exist between the two groups. Therefore, there was insufficient evidence to conclude that a receptive language delay at twenty to thirty-four months of age is a feasible predictor of lasting expressive language delays. This leads to the recommendation that additional research be conducted focusing on areas other than receptive language abilities as being predictors of poor expressive language outcomes.

Identifying the severity level of unintelligibility objectively and efficiently holds critical clinical implications for speech assessment and intervention needs. The speech of children who demonstrate phonological deviations is frequently unintelligible. The use of an accurate and time-efficient measurement of intelligibility is necessary to screen children who may be producing phonological patterns that contribute to significantly reduced intelligibility in connected speech. The purpose of this study was to investigate the degree of concurrent validity between scores received on the 1-Minute Measure of Homonymy and Intelligibility (Hodson, 1992) and speech intelligibility as measured by the percent of words understood in connected speech. For this investigation, intelligibility is operationally defined as the percent of words understood in a connected speech sample derived from orthographic transcription. Data collected were from 48 children, aged 4:0 to 5:6, who demonstrated varying levels of phonological proficiency/deficiency. A group of four listeners who had experience treating children with phonological disorders were responsible for completing orthographic transcriptions of the 48 connected speech samples. The two methods of assessing speech intelligibility investigated in this study were found to correlate highly (r = .84). This is considered a significant statistical correlation and therefore the 1-Minute Measure may be used to provide speech-language pathologists with valuable information to predict a child's intelligibility level in connected speech. A regression formula was employed to predict percentage of intelligibility when presented with a child's 1- Minute Measure score. Results from this correlational study suggest that the 1- Minute Measure of Homonymy and Intelligibility may serve as an assessment tool that can provide a speech-language pathologist with some valuable information pertaining to a child's level of intelligibility in connected speech. When used with another speech assessment tool, the 1-Minute Measure may function as a screening measure to identify preschoolers who produce phonological deviations that interfere with intelligibility of conversational speech.

No description available.

Rhythm is a feature of both music and speech that has been successfully used in the treatment of speech disorders, particularly stuttering, for many years. The successful use of rhythm in the treatment of dysf luencies of speech may be due to stutterers' perceptual deficiencies in music and rhythm abilities. Research supports the view that there are differences between stutterers and nonstutterers in timing and rhythmic capabilities. This study, therefore, sought to determine whether there was a difference between the perceptual musical abilities of stutterers versus nonstutterers as measured by the Seashore Measures of Musical Talents, Revised (1960). Data collected were from two groups of subjects consisting of 10 stutterers and 10 nonstutterers. Groups were matched according to age and gender. Subjects were examined using the Seashore, a test which measures levels of musical ability in the areas of pitch, time, timbre, rhythm, tonal memory and loudness. Subjects listened to recorded tones on a cassette tape player while marking their answers on IBM answer sheets. For example, in the pitch test, fifty pairs of tones on a cassette tape were presented. The subject determined whether the second tone presented was higher (H) or lower (L) than the first. A mark was made in either the column headed H or L. Each subtest proceeded in a similar manner. A total score of level of musical function was then determined from the scores of each subtest. Total scores and individual subtest scores were compared using the Wilcoxon Signed Ranks Test for Paired Observations (.05 level of significance) to determine whether there were overall differences between groups or differences between groups in specific areas. Results show stutterers scoring significantly lower in the rhythm subtest (P=.0077) and in total scores (P=.0244). Other significant differences were not found. These results might suggest that further support should be given to the study of actual treatment(s) using rhythmic concepts. Since no studies exist that investigate the theory that stutterers have perceptual rhythmic/timing deficiencies, studies such as this would provide normative data on musical abilities of stutterers, with emphasis on rhythm and timing abilities.

A speech; whether prepared or impromptu, ought to be a communicative process. For a speech when defined as "discourse delivered to an audience,"(1) is a communicative process by which information may be given and received. Inherent in the phrase "given and received" is the assumption that the speaker anticipates that his listener will understand and respond, and that the speech will be understood as it was intended. The difficulty present in this "intent - response" theory is the problem of insuring that the listener will understand enough to respond to what the speaker has said. In an effort to ensure response, a speaker may make use of various factors of speech which help to enhance understanding. What these factors are and how they are observed and responded to by the listener are essential questions to be considered in this study.

A sampling of teachers from two school districts was interviewed to determine the amount of use and factors affecting utilization of ITV programs in the classroom. The findings revealed a high percentage of teachers using ITV programs in their classes.Physical surroundings had the greatest influence on TV usage. Unavailability of TV sets and poor reception of t he TV signal hamper teachers usage of ITV. The teachers who used ITV incorporated the elements of pre-program preparation of the student: or what they we r e about to view and followup materials after the program. Most of the teachers felt that ITV was moderately effective as a teaching tool.

This thesis is an attempt to refine the analysis of an empirical study in intercultural proxemic behavior research conducted by Watson and Graves and is, as well, a partial and modified replication of that study. The hypothesis of this, study is that Arabs will exhibit significant differences in proxemic behavior from Americans, with Arab's being closer and more direct in their proxemic, behavior than Americans. To test this hypothesis eighteen Saudi-Arabian and eighteen American male students were observed as two groups of nine homogeneous dyads and as one group of eighteen heterogeneous dyads. Seven minute dyadic interactions in a controlled, laboratory setting were filmed and recorded on video tape. Five proxemic variables were analyzed: sociofugal-sociopetal axis, kinesthetic factors, touch code, visual code, and voice loudness scale. The video-taped data were analyzed and scored. Individual scores were averaged to arrive at dyadic scores. Twenty-five t-tests, were calculated to test for possible statistically significant differences between the cultural groups and between both groups of homogeneous dyads and the heterogeneous dyads. No significant differences were found. Thirty Pearson correlations were computed for any possible significant positive correlation among the five variables in Saudi-Arabian - American dyads and in both Saudi-Arabian and America dyads separately. Three significant positive correlations as well as three significant negative correlations were discovered. The hypothesis of the study was not supported and the findings of the Watson and Graves' study did not appear in the present examination.

The present study sought to determine the effect different stimulus material has on the language elicited from children. Its purpose was to determine whether a significant difference existed among language samples elicited three different ways when analyzed using DSS. Eighteen children between the ages of 3.6 and 5.6 years were chosen to participate in the study. All of the children had normal bearing. normal receptive vocabulary skills and no demonstrated or suspected physical or social delays. Three language samples. each elicited by either toys. pictures. or stories. were obtained from each child. For each sample. a corpus of 50 utterances was selected for analysis and analyzed according to the DSS procedure as described by Lee and Ganter (1971).

In 2011, Porismita Borah published "Conceptual Issues in Framing Theory: A Systematic Examination of a Decade’s Literature" to shed light on the status of framing research, and attempt to answer several scholars' criticisms of framing research practices (Carragee and Roefs 2004, D'Angelo, 2002, Entman, 1993). Borah argues that framing research has several areas of necessary improvement, and her prescription is for future research to be able to examine specific framing issues or effects, but also be able to connect with broader understandings of framing. The following content analysis of framing research, conducted between the year 2000 and 2013, seeks to examine the current state of framing literature, and whether or not scholarship is advancing optimally. The hope is to examine partially if Borah's concerns remain relevant to current framing research. Additionally, the current study seeks to expand the questions asked of framing research in multiple ways. What follows is an account of framing, as a theory broadly. Borah's role in attempting to measure the state of framing research is explained, and then I show how research can be expanded in several areas to be more inclusive. Then, new avenues of inquiry will be opened, particularly in regard to power, and social relationships, to delve deeper into whether or not framing research can be improved in terms of accuracy and efficacy. Following those sections is an explanation of the way my research questions have been operationalized, an account of the methodology employed by this study, our findings, and a discussion of the data and it’s meaningful portions.