[Behavior difficulties, attention difficulties and learning problems in children aged from 3.5 to 8 years: a longitudinal school study]. / Comportement perturbateur, difficultés d'attention et apprentissages entre 3,5 ans et 8 ans: une étude longitudinale en milieu scolaire.

AIM: To evaluate the long term impact of teacher's report of behavior difficulties in children aged 3.5 years. METHOD: Teachers assessed behavior and attention difficulties in 2054 children by questionnaire; reading performance, and behavior and attention difficulties were re-assessed in 695 of these children at second grade (7-8 years). RESULTS: Reading delay was not significantly associated with behavior and attention assessment at 3.5 years. Children with behavior problems according to the teacher were most often different at 3.5 years and at 7-8 years. CONCLUSION: Reading delay at second grade was not related to teacher's report of behavior problems at 3.5 years of age in this french longitudinal school study. These observations are discussed in relation to DSM-IV criteria of disruptive behavior and attention deficit in children.

[Language and behavioral difficulties at age 3 and half and reading delay in grade 2]. / Difficultés de langage et de comportement à 3 ans et demi et retard en lecture au cours élémentaire.

BACKGROUND: Early detection of specific language impairment and dyslexia in children is an important public health problem. Longitudinal studies are needed for the distinction of real impairments from simple transitory delays. METHODS: Teachers filled a 29-item questionnaire on language and behavior for 695 children aged 3.5 years. Four years later (at second grade of primary school) the same children were evaluated for reading and writing. Statistical analysis focused on the relationships between teacher's early observations and reading delay 4 years later. Associated factors were age, sex, educational level and bilinguism of the parents, and area of the school. RESULTS: The delay in written language acquisition (8.5% of the children) was significantly associated with low educational level (but not bilinguism) of the parents and to the area of the school. In univariate analysis, most of the teacher's early negative assessments were significantly related to reading/writing delay, with the exception of some behavioral problems. However, when the effect of associated factors was taken into account only a few items, mainly concerning language expression, remained significantly associated with later reading/writing delay. CONCLUSION: These data show a major role of associated factors (educational level of the parents, area of the school) in reading delay, and help to select specific teacher's observations for an early prediction of this delay.

[Screening by teachers for language and behavior difficulties in 2059 children aged 3,5 years]. / Repérage par les enseignants des difficultés de langage et de comportement chez 2,059 enfants de 3 ans et demi.

BACKGROUND: Several tools have been proposed for screening for specific language impairment and behavioral problems in pre-school children. These disorders are risk factors for later poor school achievement and social life. However, presence of real disorders must be differentiated from environmental factors, such as low educational level of the parents or bilingual family. METHODS: A 29-item teachers'questionnaire was used for screening for language and behavioral disorders in 2059 nursery-school children aged 3.5 years from 200 nursery-schools of different areas in France. RESULTS: According to the teachers, difficulties were clearly more frequent in boys than girls, in children from low educational level families, and in children with not-french-speaking parents. CONCLUSION: The gender of the child and the characteristics of the family play a very important role in the teachers'assessment of a young pre-school child's language and behavior. Longitudinal studies would be required to differentiate the presence of specific disorders, requiring individual intervention, from simple delays due to environmental factors.

[Intrinsic and co-intrinsic vowel characteristics in cerebellar and parkinsonian dysarthrias]. / Caractéristiques vocaliques intrinsèques et co-intrinsèques dans les dysarthries cérébelleuse et parkinsonienne.

Few studies were made on the intrinsic and co-intrinsic vowel characteristics in neurologic dysarthrias. This work evaluates these parameters in a group of 4 subjects with cerebellar dysarthria suffering from a cerebellar degenerative syndrome and a group of 4 subjects with Parkinson disease suffering from parkinsonian dysarthria. These subjects were compared with 10 control subjects. An intensive speech treatment inspired from the Lee Silverman voice treatment (LSVT) was applied to one of the parkinsonian subjects of the study, with assessment before and after rehabilitation. The acoustic measures assessed the duration and the frequency of the vowels [a, i, ul indifferent contexts as well as their formant frequency and sentence duration. The results show different impairments according to the type of the dysarthria, and some forms of contrast transposition. Speech therapy restores subnormal contrasts.

Short-term memory impairment and unilateral dichotic listening extinction in a child with Landau-Kleffner syndrome: auditory or phonological disorder?

The neuropsychological profile of a child with a Landau-Kleffner syndrome is presented here. The observed cognitive difficulties included verbal short-term memory and seemed partially compensated for when the experimental assessments bypassed the auditory channel. This case study is especially challenging since the child, whose phonological skills were quite efficient and who exhibited a dichotic listening unilateral extinction, had developed average reading and spelling abilities. The fact that B.E.'s performance on memory tasks was quite poor when the stimuli were presented auditorily and more efficient when the stimuli were presented visually, strongly suggests that the observed memory impairment was due to a deficit at the level of cortical auditory processing. B.E.'s phonological skills were efficient, suggesting a neuropsychological dissociation between phonological ability and auditory processing. The fact that B.E. dramatically recovered language and easily acquired reading and spelling accounts for the hypothesis that compensatory strategies allowed him to develop phonological skills from predominantly visual input.

Child speech and language assessment and measurement.

The necessity of using standardized and norm-referenced tests in assessing speech and language of impaired children has now been recognized. Thus it seems useful to summarize based on the literature principles for founding such testing methods. These include: a) the necessity for a neuropsycholinguistic model that allows the speech-language pathologist to relate the observed linguistic behavior to underlying language processes, b) the knowledge of the psychometric characteristics required for language tests, and c) a discussion of some of the difficulties or controversed points from clinical practice. Among these latter the following are discussed: 1) measurement versus clinical observation, 2) screening versus exhaustive assessment, 3) language linguistic aspects versus pragmatic dimension, 4) formal tasks versus spontaneous language analysis, 5) linguistic versus metalinguistic assessment, 6) "knowledge-dependent" versus "processing-dependent" tests, 7) early detection of at risk children versus diagnosis of developmental language disorders. Diagnosticians are advised to be aware of the principles to respect when assessing child language.

Electromyographic activity of strap and cricothyroid muscles in pitch change.

The EMG activity of the cricothyroid muscle (CT) and the three extrinsic laryngeal muscles (thyohyoid, TH; sternothyroid, ST, and sternohyoid, SH) were recorded throughout the voice range of one female and one male subject, both untrained singers. The voice range was examined using rising and falling glissandos (production of a sustained sound with progressive and continuous variation of fundamental frequency). Muscle activity was observed at various pitches during the glissandos. The strap muscle activity during the production of glissandos appears to be synergistic. At the lowest frequency, the CT is inactive but strap muscles (TH, ST, SH) are active. As frequency increases, strap muscle activity decreases while the CT controls frequency in the middle of the range. At higher frequencies the strap muscles once again become active. This activity might depend on the vocal vibratory mechanism involved. The role of the strap muscles at high pitches is a widely debated point but it seems that in some way they control the phenomena relevant to the rising pitch. The phasic-type strap muscle activity contrasts with the tonic-type activity of the CT. The CT closely controls the frequency, while the straps are not directly linked to the pitch but rather to the evolution of the frequency of voice production (speaking voice, singing voice, held notes, glissandos, trillo, vibrato, etc.).

[Change in laryngeal vibratory mechanism: a physiological entity]. / Le changement de mécanisme vibratoire laryngé: une entité physiologique.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the change of laryngeal vibratory mechanism in 10 males and 9 females trained and untrained singers. The electroglottographic (E.G.G.) data analysis demonstrated strong evidence to support the view that such event could be considered as a whole physiological entity. In fact findings clearly indicated biomechanical, neuromuscular and central levels in the control of the laryngeal vibration involved in the change of mechanism.

Individual differences in the production of word classes in eight specific language-impaired preschoolers.

The production of word classes in eight 53-62-month-old specific language-impaired (SLI) children was described and compared with that of 30 normal 24-33-month-old children in the same play situation. SLI subjects and nonimpaired children were selected within specified mean length of utterance ranges (low MLU versus high MLU). Production of word classes by subjects was evaluated in order to determine (1) whether SLI children showed a similar or a different word-class profile among themselves and when compared with non-impaired children and (2) whether MLU related to word classes would be useful as a single clinical index in assessment of language acquisition. Results showed that scores of SLI children in production of word classes reflect important individual differences among subjects. In the high-MLU sample, all SLI children produced each word class relatively within the same range as the nonimpaired group. In the low-MLU sample two SLI children were very different in their word-class profile and individual differences were further confirmed by a discriminant function analysis. Correlations between MLU and word classes were significant in nonimpaired children for all variables except Questions and Onomatopoeia and were only significant in SLI children for Verbs, Prepositions, and Personal Pronouns. Such findings contribute support to the view that there is "deviant" pattern of language in SLI children and once again questions whether MLU is one of the best discriminating indicators to use in the clinical assessment of language organization.

Paravermal infarct and isolated cerebellar dysarthria.

A patient with isolated cerebellar dysarthria is reported. Computed tomography showed a small infarct in the left paravermal zone of the rostal cerebellum (lobulus simplex and semilunaris superior) in the territory of the medial branch of the superior cerebellar artery. This patient demonstrates the important role of this area of cerebellum in the control of voice.

A follow-up case study of transitory developmental apraxia of speech: 'L'enfant à voyelles'.

It is well known that the acquisition of consonants can be a more difficult developmental process than of vowels. In this study the authors describe a case of 'transitory developmental apraxia of speech' (TDAS) in which a French-speaking child, although he acquired the whole vowel system, showed a significant delay in consonant acquisition and usage. The results of systematic observations and assessments of general cognitive and specific language functioning cover a period of 4 years (age 3:8 to 7:1l), from first clinical assessment to evidence of a good academic achievement. It is argued that this case demonstrates an unusual example of TDAS. The language deficits observed could not be attributed to oromotor, neurological, cognitive or intellectual deficits. The findings here also raise crucial questions concerning the origins of such a speech disorder and why it is transient in nature.

Early detection of deafness in young children.

It is generally accepted that early detection and intervention for children with hearing defects, either congenital or acquired, is both necessary and advantageous. Detection before the end of the first year of life seems to improve speech acquisition, lessen the likelihood of behaviour problems and decrease the cost of education. The methods for early detection are discussed and a procedure is recommended.