Department of Communicative Sciences and Disorders, New York University, 665 Broadway Floor 9, New York, NY, 10012, USA.
Department of Communicative Sciences and Disorders, New York University, 665 Broadway Floor 9, New York, NY, 10012, USA.
J Commun Disord. 2022 Sep-Oct;99:106230. doi: 10.1016/j.jcomdis.2022.106230. Epub 2022 Jun 3.
Children with speech errors who have reduced motor skill may be more likely to develop residual errors associated with lifelong challenges. Drawing on models of speech production that highlight the role of somatosensory acuity in updating motor plans, this pilot study explored the relationship between motor skill and speech accuracy, and between somatosensory acuity and motor skill in children. Understanding the connections among sensorimotor measures and speech outcomes may offer insight into how somatosensation and motor skill cooperate during speech production, which could inform treatment decisions for this population.
Twenty-five children (ages 9-14) produced syllables in an /ɹ/ stimulability task before and after an ultrasound biofeedback treatment program targeting rhotics. We first tested whether motor skill (as measured by two ultrasound-based metrics of tongue shape complexity) predicted acoustically measured accuracy (the normalized difference between the second and third formant frequencies). We then tested whether somatosensory acuity (as measured by an oral stereognosis task) predicted motor skill, while controlling for auditory acuity.
One measure of tongue shape complexity was a significant predictor of accuracy, such that higher tongue shape complexity was associated with lower accuracy at pre-treatment but higher accuracy at post-treatment. Based on the same measure, children with better somatosensory acuity produced /ɹ/ tongue shapes that were more complex, but this relationship was only present at post-treatment.
The predicted relationships among somatosensory acuity, motor skill, and acoustically measured /ɹ/ production accuracy were observed after treatment, but unexpectedly did not hold before treatment. The surprising finding that greater tongue shape complexity was associated with lower accuracy at pre-treatment highlights the importance of evaluating tongue shape patterns (e.g., using ultrasound) prior to treatment, and has the potential to suggest that children with high tongue shape complexity at pre-treatment may be good candidates for ultrasound-based treatment.
运动技能较差的言语错误儿童更有可能出现与终生挑战相关的残留错误。本研究基于强调躯体感觉敏锐度在更新运动计划中的作用的言语产生模型，探讨了儿童运动技能与言语准确性之间的关系，以及躯体感觉敏锐度与运动技能之间的关系。了解感觉运动测量结果之间的联系可能有助于深入了解言语产生过程中感觉和运动技能之间的相互作用，这可以为该人群的治疗决策提供信息。
25 名儿童（年龄 9-14 岁）在接受针对 rhotics 的超声生物反馈治疗计划前后进行了/r/可激发性任务中的音节发音。我们首先测试了运动技能（由两个基于超声的舌形复杂度测量值来衡量）是否可以预测声学测量的准确性（第二和第三共振峰频率之间的归一化差异）。然后，我们在控制听觉敏锐度的情况下，测试了躯体感觉敏锐度（通过口腔立体感测试来衡量）是否可以预测运动技能。
舌形复杂度的一个衡量标准是准确性的一个显著预测指标，即舌形复杂度越高，治疗前的准确性越低，但治疗后的准确性越高。基于同一衡量标准，具有更好的躯体感觉敏锐度的儿童产生的/r/舌形更复杂，但这种关系仅在治疗后存在。
在治疗后观察到了躯体感觉敏锐度、运动技能和声学测量/r/产生准确性之间的预测关系，但令人惊讶的是，在治疗前并不存在。在治疗前，舌形复杂性越大与准确性越低相关的惊人发现强调了在治疗前评估舌形模式（例如，使用超声）的重要性，并且有可能表明治疗前舌形复杂性较高的儿童可能是超声治疗的良好候选者。
