Tongue Shape Complexity in Children With and Without Speech Sound Disorders.

PURPOSE: This study investigates the hypothesis that younger speakers and speakers with more severe speech sound disorders are more likely to use simpler (undifferentiated) tongue gestures due to difficulties with, or immaturity of, lingual motor control. METHOD: The hypothesis is tested using cross-sectional secondary data analysis of synchronous audio and high-speed ultrasound recordings from children with idiopathic speech sound disorders (n = 30, aged 5;0-12;11 [years;months]) and typically developing children (n = 29, aged 5;8-12;10), producing /a/, /t/, /ɹ/, /l/, /s/, and /ʃ/ in an intervocalic /aCa/ environment. Tongue shape complexity is measured using NINFL (Number of INFLections) and modified curvature index (MCI) from splines fitted to ultrasound images at the point of maximal lingual gesture. Age, perceived accuracy, and consonant are used as predictors. RESULTS: The results suggest that as age increases, children with speech sound disorders have lower MCI compared to typically developing children. Increase in age also led to decrease of MCI for the typically developing group. In the group of children with speech sound disorders, perceptually incorrect /ɹ/ productions have lower MCI than correct productions, relative to /a/. CONCLUSIONS: There is some evidence of systematic tongue shape complexity differences between typically developing children and children with speech sound disorders when accounting for increase in age. Among children with speech sound disorders, increase in age and perceptually incorrect consonant realizations are associated with decreasing tongue shape complexity.

Comparing Vocal Health and Attitudes to Voice care in Primary Teachers and Voiceover Artists - A Survey Study Using the Health Belief Model.

OBJECTIVES: A range of professions experience high demands on their voices and are potentially at risk of developing voice disorders. Teachers have been studied extensively in this respect, while voiceover artists are a growing professional group with unknown levels of voice training, voice problems and voice care attitudes. To better understand profession-specific voice care requirements, we compared voice training, voice care habits and self-reported voice problems of these two professional groups and measured attitudes to voice care, informed by the Health Belief Model (HBM). STUDY DESIGN: The study was a cross-sectional survey study with two cohorts. METHODS: We surveyed 264 Scottish primary school teachers and 96 UK voiceover artists . Responses were obtained with multiple-choice and free-text questions. Attitudes to voice care were assessed with Likert-type questions that addressed five dimensions of the HBM. RESULTS: Most voiceover artists had some level of voice training, compared to a minority of teachers. Low numbers of teachers reported regular voice care, compared to over half of voiceover artists. Higher numbers of teachers reported work-related voice problems. Voiceover artists reported greater awareness for vocal health and perceived potential effects of voice problems on their work as more severe. Voiceover artists also saw voice care as more beneficial. Teachers perceived barriers to voice care as substantially higher and felt less confident about voice care. Teachers with existing voice problems showed increased perceptions of voice problem susceptibility and severity and saw more benefit in voice care. Cronbach's alpha was below 0.7 for about half of the HBM-informed survey subsets, suggesting that reliability could be improved. CONCLUSIONS: Both groups reported substantial levels of voice problems, and different attitudes to voice care suggest that the two groups require different approaches to preventative intervention. Future studies will benefit from the inclusion of further attitude dimensions beyond the HBM.

Adult speakers' tongue-palate contact patterns for bilabial stops within complex clusters.

Previous studies using Electropalatography (EPG) have shown that individuals with speech disorders sometimes produce articulation errors that affect bilabial targets, but currently there is limited normative data available. In this study, EPG and acoustic data were recorded during complex word final /sps/ clusters spoken by 20 normal adults. A total contact (TC) index measured amount of tongue-palate contact during clusters in words such as 'crisps'. Bilabial closure was inferred from the acoustic signal. The TC profiles indicated that normal adults hold their tongues in a steady /s/-like position throughout the cluster; most speakers (85%, n=17) had no significant difference in TC values during bilabial closure compared to flanking fricatives. The results are interpreted as showing that normal speakers produce double bilabial-alveolar articulations for /p/ in these clusters. Although steady state TC profiles were typical of the group, absolute TC values varied considerably between speakers, with some speakers having up to three times more contact than others. These findings add to the knowledge about normal articulation, and will help to improve diagnosis and treatment of individuals with speech disorders.