The use of email as a component of adult stammering therapy : a preliminary report

In West Glasgow email has evolved from a rapid means of arranging therapy appointments with adults who stammer into a medium for exchange of therapeutic messages with some clients. Since 2004, sixteen clients have used email to communicate as part of their therapy programme. The benefits include improving access to services, supporting speech change, facilitating lasting personal growth, improving clinical decision-making, equalizing the therapist-client relationship and enhancing caseload management. Although this experience suggests that email is appropriate for stammering therapy, the effectiveness and ethics of, and the rationale for, clinical practice that includes email need careful consideration. Further research is required to formally evaluate the client experience

Short-and medium-term plasticity for speaker adaptation seem to be independent

The author wishes to thank James McQueen and Elizabeth Johnson for comments made on an earlier drafts of this paper.In a classic paper, Ladefoged and Broadbent [1] showed that listeners adapt to speakers based on short-term exposure of a single phrase. Recently, Norris, McQueen, and Cutler [2] presented evidence for a lexically conditioned medium-term adaptation to a particular speaker based on an exposure of 40 critical words among 200 items. In two experiments, I investigated whether there is a connection between the two findings. To this end, a vowel-normalization paradigm (similar to [1]) was used with a carrier phrase that consisted of either words or nonwords. The range of the second formant was manipulated and this affected the perception of a target vowel in a compensatory fashion: A low F2-range made it more likely that a target vowel was perceived as a front vowel, that is, with an inherently high F2. Manipulation of the lexical status of the carrier phrase, however, did not affect vowel normalization. In contrast, the range of vowels in the carrier phrase did influence vowel normalization. If the carrier phrase consisted of high-front vowels only, vowel categories shifted only for high-front vowels. This may indicate that the short-term and medium-term adaptations are brought about by different mechanisms.peer-reviewe

Dysphagia training for speech-language pathologists: implications for clinical practice

There are competency standards available in countries with established speech-language pathology services to guide basic dysphagia training with ongoing workplace mentoring for advanced skills development. Such training processes, however, are not as well established in countries where speech-language pathology training and practice is relatively new, such as Malaysia. The current study examines the extent of dysphagia training and workplace support available to speech-language pathologists (SLPs) in Malaysia and Queensland, Australia, and explores clinicians’ perceptions of the training and support provided, and of their knowledge, skills, and confidence. Using a matched cohort cross-sectional design, a purpose-built survey was administered to 30 SLPs working in Malaysian government hospitals and 30 SLPs working in Queensland Health settings in Australia. Malaysian clinicians were found to have received significantly less university training, less mentoring in the workplace, and were lacking key infrastructure needed to support professional development in dysphagia management. Over 90% of Queensland clinicians were confident and felt they had adequate skills in dysphagia management; in contrast, significantly lower levels of knowledge, skills, and confidence were observed in the Malaysian cohort. The findings identify a need for improved university training and increased opportunities for workplace mentoring, training, and support for Malaysian SLPs

Prosodic structure affects the production and perception of voice-assimilated German fricatives

Prosodic structure has long been known to constrain phonological processes [1]. More recently, it has also been recognized as a source of fine-grained phonetic variation of speech sounds. In particular, segments in domain-initial position undergo prosodic strengthening [2, 3], which also implies more resistance to coarticulation in higher prosodic domains [5]. The present study investigates the combined effects of prosodic strengthening and assimilatory devoicing on word-initial fricatives in German, the functional implication of both processes for cues to the fortis-lenis contrast, and the influence of prosodic structure on listeners’ compensation for assimilation. Results indicate that 1. Prosodic structure modulates duration and the degree of assimilatory devoicing, 2. Phonological contrasts are maintained by speakers, but differ in phonetic detail across prosodic domains, and 3. Compensation for assimilation in perception is moderated by prosodic structure and lexical constraints.peer-reviewe

Identification of phonological processes in preschool children's single-word productions

Speech and language therapists (SLTs) often refer to phonological data norms as part of their assessment protocols in evaluating the communication skills of the pre-school child. There is a variety of norms available and although broadly similar, differences are embedded within their definitions of mastery of the adult target system. Presence of velar fronting, stopping of affricates and [s] reduction in the dataset was found to mirror previous research. However, there was a lower than expected incidence by age groups of palato-alveolar fronting, stopping of fricatives and obstruent cluster reduction

Pointing gestures do not influence the perception of lexical stress

We investigated whether seeing a pointing gesture influences the perceived lexical stress. A pitch contour continuum between the Dutch words "CAnon" ('canon') and "kaNON" ('cannon') was presented along with a pointing gesture during the first or the second syllable. Pointing gestures following natural recordings but not Gaussian functions influenced stress perception (Experiment 1 and 2), especially when auditory context preceded (Experiment 2). This was not replicated in Experiment 3. Natural pointing gestures failed to affect the categorization of a pitch peak timing continuum (Experiment 4). There is thus no convincing evidence that seeing a pointing gesture influences lexical stress perception.This research was supported in part by an Innovational Research Incentive Scheme Veni grant from the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) awarded to first author. The authors thank Lies Cuijpers for her help with the experiments.peer-reviewe