This study examined the effects of classroom noise on an auditory processing task of learning disabled children, with distractibility, activity, and cognition controlled. Forty children divided into normal and learning disabled groups were administered both forms of the Wepman Auditory Discrimination Test. Two listening conditions were tested: (1) the relative quiet of small test rooms, and (2) classroom noise (on a tape recorder) in the same test rooms. Results showed that learning disabled children made significantly more auditory discrimination errors than normals in both quiet and noise conditions. Both normal and learning disabled children made significantly more auditory discrimination errors in noise than in quiet. It cannot be said that the noise affected the two groups differentially; the magnitude of the differences was comparable statistically. It was concluded that auditory discrimination scores in quiet do not reflect accurately the expected value for the classroom.

Forty-six deaf children ranging in age from 3 to 15 years were given both the Templin-Darley 50 item and 116 item Diagnostic Articulation Tests. Consonants were studied relative to sound position, place of articulation, manner of articulation, voicing, and blend combinations. The data showed trends parallel to those manifested in defective articulation patterns due to organic and functional anomalies. Some of the critical factors were: initial sound position, visibility, phonetic power, neurogenic complexity in producing the phoneme, voicing, hearing level, and age. Vowels were studied relative to age, tongue placement, and tongue height. Trends were similar to those found with consonants. A rank order of articulating errors was suggestive of a maturational programing of most difficult to least difficult sound regardless of etiology.

No abstract

No abstract

This experiment investigated the possibility that autistic adolescents may avoid speech communication with the world around them by "tuning out" or perceptually suppressing auditory speech stimuli. The tune-out auditory suppression hypothesis was investigated using the subject's own speech as the stimulus under three perceptual-motor conditions: with speech in a delayed auditory feedback (DAF) mode, with a white noise masking speech mode, and with speech in a normal, quiet listening mode. Five autistic adolescents were compared with six normal controls on speech time duration and sound level. DAF increased the speech sound pressure level (SPL) and increased speech time duration for both groups.