In some cochlear implant users, success is not achieved in spite of optimal clinical factors (including age at implantation, duration of rehabilitation and post-implant hearing level), which may be attributed to disorders at higher levels of the auditory pathway. We used cortical auditory evoked potentials to investigate the ability to perceive…

This study explored the developmental trends and phonetic category formation in bilingual children and adults. Participants included 30 fluent Spanish-English bilingual children, aged 8-11, and bilingual adults, aged 18-40. All completed gating tasks that incorporated code-mixed Spanish-English stimuli. There were significant differences in…

Individuals with aphasia have more problems detecting small differences between speech sounds than larger ones. This paper reports how phonemic processing is impaired and how this is influenced by speechreading. A non-word discrimination task was carried out with "audiovisual", "auditory only" and "visual only" stimulus display. Subjects had to…

This brief article reflects on some pitfalls inherent in the learning and teaching of segmental phonetic transcription. We suggest that a gestural interpretation to disordered speech data, in conjunction with segmental phonetic transcription, can add valuable insight into patterns of disordered speech, and that a gestural orientation should form…

This perceptual study describes changes in how listeners perceive VCV elements within successive truncations taken from an iambic phrase containing l (e.g. "a leaf", or "a load") spoken by four male speakers of General American English. Evidence of the respective roles of dorsal gestural affiliation between l and the reduced…

This study investigates neighbourhood density effects on lexical decision performance (both accuracy and response times) of aphasic patients. Given earlier results on lexical activation and deactivation in Broca's and Wernicke's aphasia, the prediction was that smaller neighbourhood density effects would be found for Broca's aphasic patients,…

The current investigation examined the development of voice onset time (VOT) in Standard-Greek (SG) and Cypriot-Greek (CG)-speaking children at age levels 2;0-2;5, 2;6-2;11, 3;0-3;5, and 3;6-4;0 years. SG presents with a two-way voicing contrast (voiced and voiceless unaspirated stops) whereas CG is a three-way contrast dialect containing…

Children with primary or "specific" language impairment (PLI) demonstrate subtle deficits in non-linguistic cognitive processing skills that may play a causal or contributing role in PLI. The purpose of this study was to investigate the possibility that short-term treatment of non-linguistic cognitive processing skills improves language abilities…

Research in the field of speech production pathology is dominated by describing deficits in output. However, perceptual problems might underlie, precede, or interact with production disorders. The present study hypothesizes that the level of the production disorders is linked to level of perception disorders, thus lower-order production problems…

Lesion studies have demonstrated impairments of specific types of phonological processes. However, results from neuropsychological studies of speech sound processing have been inconclusive as to the role of specific brain regions because of a lack of a one-to-one correspondence between behavioural patterns and lesion location. Functional…

The current study aimed to provide a comprehensive analysis of linguopalatal contact patterns in participants with acquired apraxia of speech (AOS). Tongue-to-palate contacts were recorded for three participants with AOS during consonant singletons and consonant clusters using the Reading Electropalatograph (EPG3) system. Amount and pattern of…

In a previous study, Parisse suggested that subject dislocations in French language (e.g. "la fille "elle" dort") could be considered as a marker of morphosyntactic development in children with normal language development. The present study aimed to develop this proposition and to confirm it with experimental data, more…

Patients with lesions of the left hemisphere often suffer from oral-facial apraxia, apraxia of speech, and aphasia. In these patients, visual features often play a critical role in speech and language therapy, when pictured lip shapes or the therapist's visible mouth movements are used to facilitate speech production and articulation. This demands…

In the present study, voice onset time (VOT) measurements were compared between a group of individuals with moderate Alzheimer's disease (AD) and a group of healthy age- and gender-matched peers. Participants read a list of consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words, which included the six stop consonants. The VOT measurements were made from…

Few studies have examined the ability of individuals with learning disabilities, in general, or with Down syndrome, specifically, to discriminate speech. The purpose of this study was compare the speech discrimination abilities of eight children with Down syndrome (aged 5.7 to 12.8 years) to seven nonverbal mental-age matched controls (aged 4.0 to…