Nittrouer Susan, Burton Lisa Thuente
Boys Town National Research Hospital, 555 North 30th Street, Omaha, NE, USA.
J Commun Disord. 2005 Jan-Feb;38(1):29-63. doi: 10.1016/j.jcomdis.2004.03.006.
This study tested the hypothesis that early language experience facilitates the development of language-specific perceptual weighting strategies believed to be critical for accessing phonetic structure. In turn, that structure allows for efficient storage and retrieval of words in verbal working memory, which is necessary for sentence comprehension. Participants were forty-nine 5-year-olds, evenly distributed among four groups: those with chronic otitis media with effusion (OME), low socio-economic status (low-SES), both conditions (both), or neither condition (control). All children participated in tasks of speech perception and phonological awareness. Children in the control and OME groups participated in additional tasks examining verbal working memory, sentence comprehension, and temporal processing. The temporal-processing task tested the hypothesis that any deficits observed on the language-related tasks could be explained by temporal-processing deficits. Children in the three experimental groups demonstrated similar results to each other, but different from the control group for speech perception and phonological awareness. Children in the OME group differed from those in the control group on tasks involving verbal working memory and sentence comprehension, but not temporal processing. Overall these results supported the major hypothesis explored, but failed to support the hypothesis that language problems are explained to any extent by temporal-processing problems.
As a result of this activity, the participant will be able to (1) Explain the relation between language experience and the development of mature speech perception strategies, phonological awareness, verbal working memory, and syntactic comprehension. (2) Name at least three populations of individuals who exhibit delays in the development of mature speech perception strategies, phonological awareness, verbal working memory, and syntactic comprehension, and explain why these delays exist for each group. (3) Point out why perceptual strategies for speech are different for different languages. (4) Describe Baddeley's model [A.D. Baddeley, The development of the concept of working memory: implications and contributions of neuropsychology, in: G. Vallar, T. Shallice (Eds.), Neuropsychological Impairments of Short-term Memory, Cambridge University Press, New York, 1990, p. 54] of verbal working memory.
本研究检验了这样一个假设，即早期语言经历有助于形成特定语言的感知加权策略，而这种策略被认为对于获取语音结构至关重要。反过来，这种结构能够在言语工作记忆中有效地存储和检索单词，而这对于句子理解是必要的。研究参与者为49名5岁儿童，平均分为四组：患有慢性中耳积液（OME）的儿童、社会经济地位低（低SES）的儿童、同时患有这两种情况（两者皆有）的儿童以及两种情况都没有（对照组）的儿童。所有儿童都参与了言语感知和语音意识任务。对照组和OME组的儿童还参与了其他任务，以考察言语工作记忆、句子理解和时间处理能力。时间处理任务检验了这样一个假设，即与语言相关任务中观察到的任何缺陷都可以用时间处理缺陷来解释。三个实验组的儿童在言语感知和语音意识方面彼此表现出相似的结果，但与对照组不同。OME组的儿童在涉及言语工作记忆和句子理解的任务上与对照组不同，但在时间处理方面没有差异。总体而言，这些结果支持了所探讨的主要假设，但未能支持语言问题在任何程度上都可由时间处理问题来解释的假设。
通过这项活动，参与者将能够（1）解释语言经历与成熟言语感知策略、语音意识、言语工作记忆和句法理解发展之间的关系。（2）说出至少三类在成熟言语感知策略、语音意识、言语工作记忆和句法理解发展方面存在延迟的人群，并解释每组出现这些延迟的原因。（3）指出为什么不同语言的言语感知策略不同。（4）描述巴德利的言语工作记忆模型[A.D. 巴德利，工作记忆概念的发展：神经心理学的影响和贡献，载于：G. 瓦拉尔、T. 沙利斯（编），《短期记忆的神经心理学损伤》，剑桥大学出版社，纽约，1990年，第54页]。
