Pro-fono : revista de atualizacao cientifica最新文献

Background: Reliability of Reading and Writing Assessment Instruments.

Aim: To investigate the reliability of two scales created to evaluate both reading and writing of children with ages between 8:0 and 11:11 years.

Method: Two scales were created: a reading scale, composed of 12 testing items organized into four competency fields (letter knowledge and phonographemic relation, decoding of isolated items, reading fluency, reading comprehension), and a writing scale, with five items organized into three fields (letter writing and graphophonemic relation, codification of isolated items, writing construction). One hundred students (64 girls) from Public Schools, with ages raging between 8:0 and 11:11 years, were selected. Twenty students (12 girls) participated in the applicability study, resulting in the study version of the Scales. These scales were later applied to the remaining 80 students (52 girls). The obtained responses were assessed and computed for score assignment: item scores, competence field score (CFS) and raw scale score (RSS). Data were submitted to statistical analysis: the Cronbach's alpha coefficient was calculated and correlations between items (Pearson's correlation coefficient) were verified. A significance level of 0.05 was used.

Results: a = 0.866 and a = 0.461 were obtained for the Reading and Writing Scales, respectively. Correlations between the items were observed, ranging from weak to strong, and confirmed the alpha values.

Conclusion: The Reading Scale was proven reliable, achieving acceptable levels for diagnostic instruments; the Writing Scale did not present an acceptable reliability level to measure the performance of the tested children.

Background: Speech acoustics.

Aim: To acoustically analyze the substitution between /t/ and /k/ in the speech production of children with typical and deviant acquisition process in order to identify and quantify the presence of covert contrast.

Method: The experiment involved the repetition of words that combined /t/ and /k/ with /a/ and /u/ in stressed position. Participants were 9 children divided in three groups: children in the acquisition process of the phonological contrast (G1); children with phonological disorder (G2); and children with typical productions (G3). The speech productions were analyzed and edited using software Praat. The acoustic parameters adopted were: burst spectral characteristics; CV transition and durational characteristics. Duration parameters were analyzed by Friedman ANOVA while the other parameters were analyzed using two-way ANOVA and Hierarchical Linear Modeling. The adopted statistical significance level was of 0.05.

Results: Acoustic analysis indicated the presence of covert contrast in the productions of children in G1 and G2 (80% and 57.14% of substitutions respectively). In addition, acoustic analysis revealed differences in how well the children differentiated the two occlusives and which acoustic parameters were used to differentiate them.

Conclusion: A lot of the substitutions presented in the speech of children in typical and deviant acquisition process are in fact covert contrasts. Moreover, the acoustic analyses allowed the detection of differences in the fine phonetic detail of children's speech production.

Background: Auditory processing (AP) and phonological awareness (PA) in children with and without phonological disorders.

Aim: To compare the performance of children with and without phonological disorders in a PA test; to verify the possible relationship between performances in distinct tasks of this test with the performance in the AP evaluation.

Method: Participants were 44 children with and without the diagnosis of phonological disorder, aged between 5:0 and 7:0 years, of both genders. After speech samples were gathered, subjects were divided into two groups: a study group (SG), composed by children with phonological disorders, and a control group (CG) with children without phonological disorders. PA was assessed through the Protocol Task Awareness Test (PTAT), and through the simplified AP evaluation (screening)--Disyllabic change--Staggered Spondaic Word (SSW), dichotic listening test and the binaural fusion test.

Results: In both PA and AP assessments, children of the CG obtained better results. When correlating the results of AP and PA, a greater number of correlations were observed for the SG.

Conclusion: A significant relationship between the performance in the AP evaluation and success in PA tasks exists for children with phonological disorders.

Background: The narrative abilities provide valuable information about the linguistic, cognitive and social development of school-age children with typical language development (TLD).

Aim: To examine the temporal ordering of figures and the narrative abilities of school-age children with TLD in relation to the type of discourse presented.

Method: Participants of this study included 60 children with TLD aged between seven and ten years of age. Fifteen stories were used in the study. Each story was illustrated by four figures. The sequences of figures were created and classified as mechanical, behavioral and intentional according to the relationships presented among the characters. Data were transcribed and analyzed regarding the type of discourse (descriptive, causal and intentional) and the type of organization of the figures.

Results: No differences between age groups were observed for temporal ordering. For all age groups, the most frequently presented discourse type was the causal one. Statistically significant differences were observed among age groups for the causal and intentional discourse type. Inasmuch as the age increased, school-age children with TLD reduced the use of the descriptive discourse and increased the use of the intentional one.

Conclusion: The ability of temporal ordering is already developed in children with TLD at seven-years of age. The type of discourse was influenced by age and by the type of story presented.

Background: Audiological evaluation of parents of individuals with autosomal recessive hearing loss.

Aim: To study the audiological profile of parents of individuals with autosomal recessive hearing loss, inferred by family history or by molecular tests that detected heterozygous mutations in the GJB2 gene. This gene codes Connexin 26.

Method: Participants were 36 subjects, ranging between 30 and 60 years, who were divided into two groups: a control group composed by individuals without auditory complaints and without family history of hearing loss, and a research group composed by heterozygous parents of individuals with autosomal recessive hearing loss or heterozygous for connexin 26 mutations. All subjects underwent pure tone audiometry (0.25 to 8 kHz), high frequencies audiometry (9 to 20 kHz) and distortion product otoacoustic emissions (DPOAE).

Results: There were significant differences between the groups when considering the amplitude of DPOAE in the frequencies of 1001 and 1501 Hz. Amplitude was higher in the control group. There was no significant difference between the groups for pure tone thresholds from 0.25 to 20 KHz.

Conclusion: The DPOAE were more effective, in comparison to the pure tone audiometry, to detect auditory differences between the groups. More studies of this type are necessary to confirm the observed results.

Background: Objective and systematized analysis of cognitive and expressive language development.

Aim: To characterize expressive language and cognitive development considering the diversity and complexity of children's productions.

Method: This study involved 20 subjects (10 male and 10 female), who were adequate for gestational age and birth weight and had no pre, peri or post natal intercurrences. Participants were submitted to 30-minute sessions, once a month, for the observation of expressive language and cognitive development. The observations were made during the period that went from eight to 18 months of age, using the material and application procedures suggested by the PELCDO-r.

Results: The amount of different schemes, gestures and verbalizations that children were capable of producing (diversity and complexity) are presented and analyzed considering each one of the 30-minute sessions as well as the overall total during the period of observation (from eight to 18 months).

Conclusion: The PELCDO-r allowed the characterization of expressive language and cognitive development by means of the objective observation of this process concerning the diversity and complexity of subjects' productions, considering the period between the fourth phase of sensorimotor stage and the beginning of preoperational stage.

Background: Quality and frequency variability of adolescents' voice, during puberty, in different phonation tasks.

Aim: To analyze the vocal stability of adolescents in three different phonation tasks using a voice perceptual analysis.

Method: Participants were male students (n = 46 individuals), ranging in age from 13 to 15 years, from a public school in Campinas--SP. Voice samples were recorded using a digital recorder in three different tasks: speaking a sustained vowel /a/, counting from one to ten, and reading. Three voice specialists evaluated stability by means of voice perceptual analysis. For the voice samples that were considered unstable, the Analogical Visual Scale (AVS) of 10 cm was used to estimate the instability level, where zero means absence of instability and ten refers to maximum instability.

Results: 78.3% of the adolescents presented vocal instability when speaking the sustained vowel, varying from one to nine in the AVS. Only one adolescent presented unstable voice when counting numbers (level = 1). Vocal instability was not observed during reading for any of the participants. Vocal stability varied significantly among phonation tasks and adolescents showed greater instability during the sustained vowel (p<0.0001; g.l = 2).

Conclusion: Counting numbers and reading do not detect vocal instability; the production of a sustained vowel demonstrated to be a better task.

Background: Brazilian adaptation of the reading processes assessment (Prolec).

Aim: To characterize and compare the performance of students from public and private teaching institutions from the 1st to the 4th grades in the adaptation of the reading processes assessment (Prolec).

Method: 262 students from the 1st to the 4th grades of elementary school participated in this study. Participants were distributed as follows: Group I (GI) consisted of 122 students from the 1st to the 4th grades of public elementary schools and Group II (GII) consisted of 140 students from the 1st to the 4th grades of private elementary schools. The adapted version of the reading processes assessment (Prolec) was applied.

Results: The results indicated that GII performed better in tests of sound identification, word choosing, words reading, low-frequency words reading, pseudo-words reading, sentences comprehension and text comprehension. Both groups presented a lower performance than the expected in Prolec tests Spanish version.

Conclusions: The adaptation of the Prolec to the Brazilian reality appears to be appropriate for the establishment of a reading profile of students, from public and private teaching institutions, who are undergoing the initial phase of literacy.

Background: Auditory evoked potentials in children with phonological disorder.

Aim: To characterize the long latency auditory evoked potentials (LLAEP) results N1, P2, N2 and P300 of children with phonological disorder and to verify the improvement of such potentials with speech therapy.

Method: 25 children without phonological disorder (control group) and 41 with phonological disorder (study group) underwent a basic audiological evaluation and LLAEP. The study group was divided into two subgroups: subgroup A composed by 22 children, underwent 12 sessions of speech therapy and were submitted to audiological retesting after this period, and subgroup B composed by 19 children, who were also reassessed three months after the initial testing.

Results: Statistically significant differences between groups for the P2 and P300 latencies and P300 amplitude were observed. Comparison between the first and the second audiological assessments indicated no significant statistical differences between both subgroups regarding wave latencies. However, a significant statistical difference was verified for the P300 (study subgroup A) and P2/N2 (study subgroup B) wave amplitudes. The study group presented higher percentage of altered results in the P300; wave latency increase was the most frequent type of alteration. After speech therapy, the results of all components improved, however, there was no association between the improvement of LLAEP results with the background of otitis, as well as with the Percentage of Consonants Correct-Revised.

Conclusion: Children with phonological disorder present altered P300 suggesting involvement of the central auditory pathway, probably due to alterations in the auditory processing, presenting improvement in all components of LLAEP results after speech therapy.

Background: After the adaptation of hearing aids, an improvement in speech understanding is expected to occur, called acclimatization.

Aim: To determine the effect of acclimatization in sentences recognition threshold, for the conditions of silence (SRTQ) and noise (SRTN), in new users of hearing aids, evaluated prior to and after acclimatization, without the use of the hearing aids.

Method: Participants were 40 individuals, aged between 28 and 78 years, with mild to moderate sensorineural hearing loss. Tests were conducted in three sessions: prior to the adaptation of the hearing aids, fourteen days and three months later.The Portuguese Sentences Lists test in free field was used for testing, and the SRTQ and SRTN were obtained (with noise level settled at 65 dB A). Results were expressed through the signal/noise ratios.

Results: The mean values for the SRTQ in the 1st, 2nd and 3rd sessions were 54.43, 51.71 and 52.22 dB A respectively,. The mean signal/noise ratios for the 1st, 2nd and 3rd sessions were 1.67, 0.30 and -0.03 dB A. When comparing the results obtained between the testing sessions, a statistically significant difference was observed between the 1st and 2nd sessions, and between the 1st and 3rd sessions for the values obtained in the testing conditions of silence and noise.

Conclusion: There was a progressive reduction of sentences recognition thresholds and signal/noise ratios indicating an improvement in performance even when assessing the individuals without the hearing aids. This improvement can be related to the effect of acclimatization.