Harnessing automatic speech recognition to realise Sustainable Development Goals 3, 9, and 17 through interdisciplinary partnerships for children with communication disability.

PURPOSE: To showcase how applications of automatic speech recognition (ASR) technology could help solve challenges in speech-language pathology practice with children with communication disability, and contribute to the realisation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). RESULT: ASR technologies have been developed to address the need for equitable, efficient, and accurate assessment and diagnosis of communication disability in children by automating the transcription and analysis of speech and language samples and supporting dual-language assessment of bilingual children. ASR tools can automate the measurement of and help optimise intervention fidelity. ASR tools can also be used by children to engage in independent speech production practice without relying on feedback from speech-language pathologists (SLPs), thus bridging the long-standing gap between recommended and received intervention intensity. These innovative technologies and tools have been generated from interdisciplinary partnerships between SLPs, engineers, data scientists, and linguists. CONCLUSION: To advance equitable, efficient, and effective speech-language pathology services for children with communication disability, SLPs would benefit from integrating ASR solutions into their clinical practice. Ongoing interdisciplinary research is needed to further advance ASR technologies to optimise children's outcomes. This commentary paper focusses on industry, innovation and infrastructure (SDG 9) and partnerships for the goals (SDG 17). It also addresses SDG 1, SDG 3, SDG 4, SDG 8, SDG 10, SDG 11, and SDG 16.

Assessing Working Memory in Children: The Comprehensive Assessment Battery for Children - Working Memory (CABC-WM).

The Comprehensive Assessment Battery for Children - Working Memory (CABC-WM) is a computer-based battery designed to assess different components of working memory in young school-age children. Working memory deficits have been identified in children with language-based learning disabilities, including dyslexia1,2 and language impairment3,4, but it is not clear whether these children exhibit deficits in subcomponents of working memory, such as visuospatial or phonological working memory. The CABC-WM is administered on a desktop computer with a touchscreen interface and was specifically developed to be engaging and motivating for children. Although the long-term goal of the CABC-WM is to provide individualized working memory profiles in children, the present study focuses on the initial success and utility of the CABC-WM for measuring central executive, visuospatial, phonological loop, and binding constructs in children with typical development. Immediate next steps are to administer the CABC-WM to children with specific language impairment, dyslexia, and comorbid specific language impairment and dyslexia.

The Role of Socioeconomic Status in the Narrative Story Retells of School-Aged English Language Learners.

Purpose: We examined the relationship between maternal level of education as an index of socioeconomic status (SES) on the narrative story retells of school-aged children who are English language learners (ELLs) to guide interpretation of results. Method: Using data available from the Systematic Analysis of Language Transcripts database (Miller & Iglesias, 2012), we were able to compare the language samples of 907 ELL students in kindergarten and 2nd grade whose parents had different levels of education. We used a simple linear regression to see if maternal level of education was predictive of measures of vocabulary, syntax, and narrative structure in Spanish and English narrative story retells. Results: There were no differences in language measures between children from different SES backgrounds for the Spanish language samples. There were differences with the English language samples in four of the five measures for the kindergarten sample and only three of five measures for the older children, with a smaller percentage of the variance explained. Conclusion: Despite common knowledge that SES has a negative influence on language, the actual influence on the narrative productions of school-aged ELLs was less than anticipated for English and absent for Spanish. The implications for assessment are discussed and concluded.