Parent Reports of Young Spanish–English Bilingual Children's Productive Vocabulary: A Development and Validation Study

Purpose

This 2-phase study aims to extend research on parent report measures of children's productive vocabulary by investigating the development (n = 38) of the Spanish Vocabulary Extension and validity (n = 194) of the 100-item Spanish and English MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories Toddler Short Forms and Upward Extension (Fenson et al., 2000, 2007; Jackson-Maldonado, Marchman, & Fernald, 2013) and the Spanish Vocabulary Extension for use with parents from low-income homes and their 24- to 48-month-old Spanish–English bilingual children.

Method

Study participants were drawn from Early Head Start and Head Start collaborative programs in the Northeastern United States in which English was the primary language used in the classroom. All families reported Spanish or Spanish–English as their home language(s). The MacArthur Communicative Development Inventories as well as the researcher-designed Spanish Vocabulary Extension were used as measures of children's English and Spanish productive vocabularies.

Results

Findings revealed the forms' concurrent and discriminant validity, on the basis of standardized measures of vocabulary, as measures of productive vocabulary for this growing bilingual population.

Conclusion

These findings suggest that parent reports, including our researcher-designed form, represent a valid, cost-effective mechanism for vocabulary monitoring purposes in early childhood education settings.

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Do Live Versus Audio-Recorded Narrative Stimuli Influence Young Children's Narrative Comprehension and Retell Quality?

Purpose

The primary aim of the present study was to examine whether different ways of presenting narrative stimuli (i.e., live narrative stimuli versus audio-recorded narrative stimuli) influence children's performances on narrative comprehension and oral-retell quality.

Method

Children in kindergarten (n = 54), second grade (n = 74), and fourth grade (n = 65) were matched on their performance on a standardized oral-language comprehension task and then were randomly assigned to 1 of the 2 conditions that differed in how narrative stimuli were presented to children: live narrative stimuli and audio-recorded narrative stimuli.

Results

Kindergartners and 2nd graders in the live condition had higher mean performance on narrative comprehension, with effect sizes of .43 and .39, respectively, after accounting for age, gender, and school. No differences were found in narrative comprehension for children in 4th grade. Children's oral-retell quality did not differ as a function of condition in any grade.

Conclusion

These results suggest that how narrative stimuli are presented to children (i.e., live versus audio-recorded narrative stimuli) may affect children's narrative comprehension, particularly for young children in kindergarten and Grade 2. Implications for assessment and instruction are discussed.

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Parent Reports of Young Spanish–English Bilingual Children's Productive Vocabulary: A Development and Validation Study

Purpose

This 2-phase study aims to extend research on parent report measures of children's productive vocabulary by investigating the development (n = 38) of the Spanish Vocabulary Extension and validity (n = 194) of the 100-item Spanish and English MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories Toddler Short Forms and Upward Extension (Fenson et al., 2000, 2007; Jackson-Maldonado, Marchman, & Fernald, 2013) and the Spanish Vocabulary Extension for use with parents from low-income homes and their 24- to 48-month-old Spanish–English bilingual children.

Method

Study participants were drawn from Early Head Start and Head Start collaborative programs in the Northeastern United States in which English was the primary language used in the classroom. All families reported Spanish or Spanish–English as their home language(s). The MacArthur Communicative Development Inventories as well as the researcher-designed Spanish Vocabulary Extension were used as measures of children's English and Spanish productive vocabularies.

Results

Findings revealed the forms' concurrent and discriminant validity, on the basis of standardized measures of vocabulary, as measures of productive vocabulary for this growing bilingual population.

Conclusion

These findings suggest that parent reports, including our researcher-designed form, represent a valid, cost-effective mechanism for vocabulary monitoring purposes in early childhood education settings.

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Do Live Versus Audio-Recorded Narrative Stimuli Influence Young Children's Narrative Comprehension and Retell Quality?

Purpose

The primary aim of the present study was to examine whether different ways of presenting narrative stimuli (i.e., live narrative stimuli versus audio-recorded narrative stimuli) influence children's performances on narrative comprehension and oral-retell quality.

Method

Children in kindergarten (n = 54), second grade (n = 74), and fourth grade (n = 65) were matched on their performance on a standardized oral-language comprehension task and then were randomly assigned to 1 of the 2 conditions that differed in how narrative stimuli were presented to children: live narrative stimuli and audio-recorded narrative stimuli.

Results

Kindergartners and 2nd graders in the live condition had higher mean performance on narrative comprehension, with effect sizes of .43 and .39, respectively, after accounting for age, gender, and school. No differences were found in narrative comprehension for children in 4th grade. Children's oral-retell quality did not differ as a function of condition in any grade.

Conclusion

These results suggest that how narrative stimuli are presented to children (i.e., live versus audio-recorded narrative stimuli) may affect children's narrative comprehension, particularly for young children in kindergarten and Grade 2. Implications for assessment and instruction are discussed.

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Parent Reports of Young Spanish–English Bilingual Children's Productive Vocabulary: A Development and Validation Study

Purpose

This 2-phase study aims to extend research on parent report measures of children's productive vocabulary by investigating the development (n = 38) of the Spanish Vocabulary Extension and validity (n = 194) of the 100-item Spanish and English MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories Toddler Short Forms and Upward Extension (Fenson et al., 2000, 2007; Jackson-Maldonado, Marchman, & Fernald, 2013) and the Spanish Vocabulary Extension for use with parents from low-income homes and their 24- to 48-month-old Spanish–English bilingual children.

Method

Study participants were drawn from Early Head Start and Head Start collaborative programs in the Northeastern United States in which English was the primary language used in the classroom. All families reported Spanish or Spanish–English as their home language(s). The MacArthur Communicative Development Inventories as well as the researcher-designed Spanish Vocabulary Extension were used as measures of children's English and Spanish productive vocabularies.

Results

Findings revealed the forms' concurrent and discriminant validity, on the basis of standardized measures of vocabulary, as measures of productive vocabulary for this growing bilingual population.

Conclusion

These findings suggest that parent reports, including our researcher-designed form, represent a valid, cost-effective mechanism for vocabulary monitoring purposes in early childhood education settings.

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Do Live Versus Audio-Recorded Narrative Stimuli Influence Young Children's Narrative Comprehension and Retell Quality?

Purpose

The primary aim of the present study was to examine whether different ways of presenting narrative stimuli (i.e., live narrative stimuli versus audio-recorded narrative stimuli) influence children's performances on narrative comprehension and oral-retell quality.

Method

Children in kindergarten (n = 54), second grade (n = 74), and fourth grade (n = 65) were matched on their performance on a standardized oral-language comprehension task and then were randomly assigned to 1 of the 2 conditions that differed in how narrative stimuli were presented to children: live narrative stimuli and audio-recorded narrative stimuli.

Results

Kindergartners and 2nd graders in the live condition had higher mean performance on narrative comprehension, with effect sizes of .43 and .39, respectively, after accounting for age, gender, and school. No differences were found in narrative comprehension for children in 4th grade. Children's oral-retell quality did not differ as a function of condition in any grade.

Conclusion

These results suggest that how narrative stimuli are presented to children (i.e., live versus audio-recorded narrative stimuli) may affect children's narrative comprehension, particularly for young children in kindergarten and Grade 2. Implications for assessment and instruction are discussed.

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Effects of Different Insertion Techniques of a Cochlear Implant Electrode on the Intracochlear Pressure

To achieve a functional atraumatic insertion, low intracochlear pressure changes during the procedure are assumed to be important. The aim of this study was to observe intracochlear pressure changes due to different insertion techniques in a cochlear model. Cochlear implant electrode insertions were performed in an artificial cochlear model to record intracochlear pressure changes with a micropressure sensor to evaluate the maximum amplitude and frequency of pressure changes under different insertional conditions. We found statistically significant differences in the occurrence of intracochlear pressure peak changes comparing different techniques. Based on our model results, an insertion should be maximally supported to minimize micromovement-related pressure changes.
Audiol Neurotol 2016;21:30-37

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Relationship between tongue positions and formant frequencies in female speakers

This study examined the relationship (1) between acoustic vowel space and the corresponding tongue kinematicvowel space and (2) between formant frequencies (F1 and F2) and tongue x-y coordinates for the same time sampling point. Thirteen healthy female adults participated in this study. Electromagnetic articulography and synchronized acoustic recordings were utilized to obtain vowel acoustic and tongue kinematic data across ten speech tasks. Intra-speaker analyses showed that for 10 of the 13 speakers the acoustic vowel space was moderately to highly correlated with tongue kinematicvowel space; much weaker correlations were obtained for inter-speaker analyses. Correlations of individual formants with tongue positions showed that F1 varied strongly with tongue position variations in the y dimension, whereas F2 was correlated in equal magnitude with variations in the x and y positions. For within-speaker analyses, the size of the acoustic vowel space is likely to provide a reasonable inference of size of the tongue working space for most speakers; unfortunately there is no a priori, obvious way to identify the speakers for whom the covariation is not significant. A second conclusion is that F1 variations reflect tongue height, but F2 is a much more complex reflection of tongue variation in both dimensions.

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Performance metrics for depth-based signal separation using deep vertical line arrays

A recent publication by McCargar and Zurk [(2013). J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 133(4), EL320–EL325] introduced a modified Fourier transform-based method for passive source depth estimation using vertical line arrays deployed below the critical depth in the deep ocean. This method utilizes the depth-dependent modulation caused by the interference between the direct and surface-reflected acoustic arrivals, the observation of which is enhanced by propagation through the reliable acoustic path. However, neither the performance of this method nor its limits of applicability have yet been thoroughly investigated. This paper addresses both of these issues; the first by identifying and analyzing the factors that influence the resolution and ambiguity in the transform-based depth estimate; the second by introducing another, much simpler depth estimation method, which is used to determine the target trajectories required for observation of the interference pattern and the array requirements for accurate depth estimation.

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Temporal weighting of loudness: Comparison between two different psychophysical tasks

Psychophysical studies on loudness have so far examined the temporal weighting of loudness solely in level-discrimination tasks. Typically, listeners were asked to discriminate hundreds of level-fluctuating sounds regarding their global loudness. Temporal weights, i.e., the importance of each temporal portion of the stimuli for the loudness judgment, were then estimated from listeners' responses. Consistent non-uniform “u-shaped” temporal weighting patterns were observed, with greater weights assigned to the first and the last temporal portions of the stimuli, revealing significant primacy and recency effects, respectively. In this study, the question was addressed whether the same weighting pattern could be found in a traditional loudness estimation task. Temporal loudness weights were compared between a level-discrimination (LD) task and an absolute magnitude estimation (AME) task. Stimuli were 3-s broadband noises consisting of 250-ms segments randomly varying in level. Listeners were asked to evaluate the global loudness of the stimuli by classifying them as “loud” or “soft” (LD), or by assigning a number representing their loudness (AME). Results showed non-uniform temporal weighting in both tasks, but also significant differences between the two tasks. An explanation based on the difference in complexity between the evaluation processes underlying each task is proposed.

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Pitch and spectral resolution: A systematic comparison of bottom-up cues for top-down repair of degraded speecha)

The brain is capable of restoring missing parts of speech, a top-down repair mechanism that enhances speech understanding in noisy environments. This enhancement can be quantified using the phonemic restoration paradigm, i.e., the improvement in intelligibility when silent interruptions of interrupted speech are filled with noise. Benefit from top-down repair of speech differs between cochlear implant(CI) users and normal-hearing (NH) listeners. This difference could be due to poorer spectral resolution and/or weaker pitch cues inherent to CI transmitted speech. In CIs, those two degradations cannot be teased apart because spectral degradation leads to weaker pitch representation. A vocoding method was developed to evaluate independently the roles of pitch and spectral resolution for restoration in NH individuals. Sentences were resynthesized with different spectral resolutions and with either retaining the original pitch cues or discarding them all. The addition of pitch significantly improved restoration only at six-bands spectral resolution. However, overall intelligibility of interrupted speech was improved both with the addition of pitch and with the increase in spectral resolution. This improvement may be due to better discrimination of speech segments from the filler noise, better grouping of speech segments together, and/or better bottom-up cues available in the speech segments.

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Case 226: Oval Window Atresia.

Case 226: Oval Window Atresia.

Radiology. 2016 Feb;278(2):626-631

Authors: Hughes A, Danehy A, Adil E

Abstract
History A 6-year-old girl presented with bilateral hearing loss. Her otologic, birth, and family histories were limited, given that she was adopted, but her parents reported that she had had difficulty hearing and speaking ever since they adopted her at 2 years of age. Her parents denied a history of acute otitis media, otorrhea, otalgia, vertigo, autophony, or tinnitus since her adoption. At 2.5 years of age, a diagnosis of hearing loss was made, and she was given hearing aids. Her parents believed that she had been doing well with both receptive and expressive language since she had received the hearing aids. At examination, she had small bilateral preauricular skin tags and normal pinna. Her external auditory canals were of a normal caliber bilaterally, with no otorrhea or lesions. The tympanic membranes were translucent and mobile at pneumatic otoscopy. There was no evidence of a middle ear lesion, nor was there a Schwartz sign. She had no nystagmus or vertigo at pneumatic otoscopy. Audiometry was performed and revealed moderate to severe conductive hearing loss bilaterally, with a mixed component present at 2000 KHz. She had normal bilateral middle ear pressure at tympanometry. Thin-section computed tomography (CT) of the temporal bone was performed.

PMID: 26789605 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

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