Hitchcock Elaine R, Byun Tara McAllister, Swartz Michelle, Lazarus Roberta
Montclair State University, Bloomfield, NJ.
New York University.
Am J Speech Lang Pathol. 2017 Nov 8;26(4):1141-1158. doi: 10.1044/2017_AJSLP-16-0122.
The purpose of the present study was to document the efficacy of electropalatography (EPG) for the treatment of rhotic errors in school-age children. Despite a growing body of literature using EPG for the treatment of speech sound errors, there is little systematic evidence about the relative efficacy of EPG for rhotic errors.
Participants were 5 English-speaking children aged 6;10 to 9;10, who produced /r/ at the word level with < 30% accuracy but otherwise showed typical speech, language, and hearing abilities. Therapy was delivered in twice-weekly 30-min sessions for 8 weeks.
Four out of 5 participants were successful in achieving perceptually and acoustically accurate /r/ productions during within-treatment trials. Two participants demonstrated generalization of /r/ productions to nontreated targets, per blinded listener ratings.
The present findings support the hypothesis that EPG can improve production accuracy in some children with rhotic errors. However, the utility of EPG is likely to remain variable across individuals. For rhotics, EPG training emphasizes one possible tongue configuration consistent with accurate rhotic production (lateral tongue contact). Although some speakers respond well to this cue, the narrow focus may limit lingual exploration of other acceptable tongue shapes known to facilitate rhotic productions.
本研究旨在记录电子腭图（EPG）治疗学龄儿童卷舌音错误的疗效。尽管越来越多的文献使用EPG治疗语音错误，但关于EPG治疗卷舌音错误的相对疗效，几乎没有系统的证据。
参与者为5名6岁10个月至9岁10个月的英语儿童，他们在单词层面发/r/音的准确率低于30%，但在其他方面表现出典型的言语、语言和听力能力。治疗每周进行两次，每次30分钟，共8周。
在治疗期间的试验中，5名参与者中有4名成功实现了在感知和声学上准确的/r/音发音。根据盲听评分，两名参与者将/r/音的发音推广到未治疗的目标。
目前的研究结果支持这样的假设，即EPG可以提高一些有卷舌音错误的儿童的发音准确性。然而，EPG的效用可能因个体而异。对于卷舌音，EPG训练强调一种与准确卷舌音发音一致的可能的舌位配置（舌侧接触）。尽管一些说话者对这个提示反应良好，但狭窄的关注点可能会限制对其他已知有助于卷舌音发音的可接受舌形的舌部探索。
