Monthly Archives: May 2010
Sudden sensorineural hearing loss: when is it idiopathic?
Conclusions: Management of idiopathic sudden sensorineural hearing loss should be guided by the level of certainty of diagnosis. If there is relative uncertainty, risk factors for specific diagnoses should be sought, the patient should be followed more closely, and investigation should be tailored appropriately. Giant cell arteritis should be considered in patients older than 50 years, those exhibiting suggestive signs or symptoms, and those with elevated inflammatory markers or deranged liver function tests.
from the Journal of Laryngology and Otology
Vestibular evoked myogenic potentials in patients with fibromyalgia syndrome
Conclusions: Although patients with fibromyalgia syndrome generally have subjective neurotological symptoms, clinical and laboratory assessments usually fail to detect any objective abnormality. However, it is possible to detect abnormalities on vestibular evoked myogenic potential testing in such patients, indicating dysfunction in the vestibulospinal pathway, possibly in the saccule. Elongation of the n23 latency and of the interpeak latency of waves p13–n23, during vestibular evoked myogenic potential testing, may be a useful, objective indicator demonstrating neurotological involvement in fibromyalgia syndrome patients. Future research investigating the mechanisms of this latency elongation may help increase understanding of the pathogenesis of fibromyalgia syndrome.
from the Journal of Laryngology and Otology
child development and childcare in Japan
With increasing numbers of women joining the workforce, there is a need for quality childcare. This project, conducted in Japan and using a large number of participants, sought to standardize an evaluation scale to measure the development of children. The development of children under six years of age (N = 22,819) who are enrolled in childcare programs was evaluated by childcare professionals. Percentiles were calculated (10th, 50th, and 90th percentile points) for each item (total 192) of six developmental subscales (gross motor, fine motor, social competence, communication, vocabulary, and intelligence development). The results supported the validity of this scale in measuring child development in Japan.
from the Journal of Early Childhood Research
Perturbation Measurements in Untrained Male Voices’ Transitions From Modal to Falsetto Register
Conclusion
Register transitions are associated with increase of perturbation.
from the Journal of Voice
Spectral analysis of the voice in Down Syndrome
The voice quality of individuals with Down Syndrome (DS) is generally described as husky, monotonous and raucous. On the other hand, the voice of DS children is characterized by breathiness, roughness, and nasality and is typically low pitched. However, research on phonation and intonation in these participants is limited. The present study was designed to provide data from the spectral analysis of the human voice in DS people. A cross-sectional, observational design was applied. Thirty DS adults and 48 DS children were enrolled after clinical evaluation. Thirty men, 30 women and 46 children constituted the control group. The participants had to repeat a set of Italian words twice. The Real Time Pitch software manufactured by KayPENTAX recorded the voice. The following spectral descriptors were obtained for each word: Mean Frequency and standard deviation, Energy, Duration, Jitter and Shimmer. Test–retest performance was also checked. The voice of DS adults was characterized by a significantly higher Mean Frequency, particularly in males (p < 0.0001), by a smaller variation (p = 0.0044 in males and p = 0.0046 in females) and by a significantly lower level of Energy (p = 0.0037 in males and p = 0.0025 females). Furthermore, limited to male adults, a shorter Duration (p = 0.0156) and a smaller value of Shimmer (p = 0.0014) was observed. The difference between DS children and age-matched controls was limited, reaching significance only for the Coefficient of Variation (CV) (p = 0.031). The difference in Mean Frequency between adults and children was more evident in the control males than in all other groups. The lack of marked difference between voice characteristics of children with and without DS is outlined by findings. Pearson's correlation coefficients on repeated productions ranged from 0.23 (Jitter) to 0.86 (Mean Frequency) in children, and from 0.07 (Shimmer) to 0.86 (Mean Frequency) in adults. In the control group, all the coefficients ranged between 0.85 and 0.98. As expected, women had a higher Mean Frequency than men, but the CV was around 0.1 for both. By contrast, children had a significantly higher Mean Frequency and a lower CV. In conclusion, spectral analysis of the human voice is recommended in each laboratory of speech and language rehabilitation to exploit the accuracy of voice descriptors.
Formation of associations in auditory cortex by slow changes of tonic firing
We review event-related slow firing changes in the auditory cortex and related brain structures. Two types of changes can be distinguished, namely increases and decreases of firing, lasting in the order of seconds. Triggering events can be auditory stimuli, reinforcers, and behavioral responses. Slow firing changes terminate with reinforcers and possibly with auditory stimuli and behavioral responses. A necessary condition for the emergence of slow firing changes seems to be that subjects have learnt that consecutive sensory or behavioral events are contingent on reinforcement. They disappear when the contingencies are no longer present. Slow firing changes in auditory cortex bear similarities with slow changes of neuronal activity that have been observed in subcortical parts of the auditory system and in other non-sensory brain structures. We propose that slow firing changes in auditory cortex provide a neuronal mechanism for anticipating, memorizing, and associating events that are related to hearing and of behavioral relevance. This may complement the representation of the timing and types of auditory and auditory-related events which may be provided by phasic responses in auditory cortex. The presence of slow firing changes indicates that many more auditory-related aspects of a behavioral procedure are reflected in the neuronal activity of auditory cortex than previously assumed.
from Hearing Research
Functional results of speech and swallowing after oral microvascular free flap reconstruction
Conclusions
Microvascular free flap reconstruction of major defects after oral resections rehabilitates the functions of swallowing and speech in acceptable levels, improving quality of life in these patients.
Vestibular disorders in childhood and adolescents
The aim and objective of the study is to analyze the data of 145 vertiginous patients aged up to 18 years, which were examined at the Otoneurological Department of the Semmelweis University during the last 5 years. The study design for the analysis: the group of children (66 patients, aged up to 14 years) and group of adolescents (79 patients, ages between 14 and 18 years). Children and adolescents, who sent by otolaryngologists or pediatric neurologists, were examined. The detailed case history and routine physical examinations were followed by cochlear function tests. The vestibular test contained statokinetic test, spontaneous nystagmus with electronystagmographical (ENG) registration, positional and positioning nystagmus with Frenzel’s glasses, smooth pursuit eye movement test and caloric test with computer-based ENG. Most of the patients experienced true rotatory vertigo. The ratio of the dizziness (vertigo without direction) was 38% in the children’s and 44% in the adolescent group; 21 children and 31 adolescents had headache. Nausea and vomiting were frequent in both the groups: normal hearing was measured in 62% of children and in 82% of adolescents. The vestibular system was normal in 36% of the children’s group, and in 39% of the adolescents. In conclusion, it is important to realize that 64% of the children and 61% of the adolescents do have certain vestibular abnormalities. The most frequent cause of dizziness (24%) in the adolescent group is the extravestibular disorder-like panic disease and the anxiety disorder. At younger age, the most frequent disease that can cause vestibular symptoms is the migraine.
Preschoolers’ Establishment of Mutual Knowledge During Scripted Interactions
Previous research indicates that preschoolers’ knowledge of routine events, or scripts, benefits their communication during pretend play enactments of those events. This study examined preschoolers’ establishment of mutual knowledge, which may contribute to the success of their script-based interactions. Script-based play sessions of dyads of 4- to 5-year-olds were analyzed. When discourse partners held equal levels of script knowledge they used mutual knowledge strategies most at the beginning of the interaction, when the need was greatest. Older preschoolers were more skilled at this than were younger preschoolers. Moreover, use of mutual knowledge strategies enhanced some dimensions of children’s communication on subsequent turns.
from First Language
How New Technology Influences Parent—child Interaction: The Case of e-book Reading
This article reports on a study focusing on mother—child interactions during e-book reading compared to print book reading. Two different types of e-books were used, commercial and educational. Forty-eight kindergarten children and their mothers were assigned randomly to one of four groups, reading: (1) the printed book Just grandma and me; (2) the electronic commercial book Just grandma and me; (3) the printed book The tractor in the sandbox; and (4) the electronic-educational book The tractor in the sandbox. Compared to the printed book reading, e-book reading yielded more discourse initiated by the child and more responsiveness to maternal initiations. Printed book reading yielded more initiations and responses of mothers. Discourse during printed book reading compared to the digital context showed more expanding talk. Educational e-book reading showed more word meaning than reading the commercial e-book. The study concludes that different reading contexts influence adult—child interactions, and this may in return have different effects on children’s early literacy development.
from First Language
Interpretation and Recall of Proverbs in Three School-age Populations
The study investigates schoolchildren’s command of proverbs as a facet of figurative language, testing their ability to go beyond the referential content of the linguistic message and their familiarity with established non-literal sayings as indicative of lexical development. The tasks involved (1) interpretation of unfamiliar proverbial sayings that are non-conventionalized in Hebrew — in context-free and contextualized conditions — and (2) recall of established traditional Hebrew proverbs. Participants were 4th- and 8th-graders from three populations: typically developing children of high and low SES backgrounds respectively and a group of high SES language-impaired children. Results show a clear rise in performance with age and schooling on both tasks, with greater success in interpreting novel sayings than in recalling traditional proverbs. The language-impaired group scored lowest on all tasks, with the low SES children doing less well than their high SES peers on interpretation but better on recall.
from First Language
Quantifying the Development of Inflectional Diversity
This study introduces a new metric for assessing the inflectional diversity of morphologically analyzed language transcripts. The proposed metric is based on the intuitive notion of mean size of paradigm (MSP) and makes extensive use of random sampling procedures for normalization purposes. This approach is systematically evaluated on the basis of large sets of Dutch acquisition corpora, including both child speech and child-directed speech. It is shown to be an efficient way of controlling for sample size in the measurement of inflectional diversity, as well as a suitable method for assessing inflectional development in longitudinal data. MSP is compared with ID (inflectional diversity) introduced by Malvern, Richards, Chipere, and Durán (2004).
from First Language
Validity of a Parent Report Instrument for Irish-speaking Toddlers
Previous research has demonstrated the validity of parent report as an assessment of early vocabulary and grammatical development across a range of languages.This study adapted a well-known tool, the MacArthur—Bates Communicative Development Inventories (MCDI), to Irish (ICDI), in order to measure vocabulary and grammatical development longitudinally across a sample of 21 children. Results from the parent checklists were validated against spontaneous language samples. Correlations demonstrated high concurrent validity for ICDI reported vocabulary with measures of lexical diversity derived from the spontaneous samples. In addition, ICDI measures of grammar also correlated highly with various indices of grammar from the spontaneous samples. Although both ICDI and spontaneous vocabulary measures were highly correlated, the ICDI checklist includes a broader range of language skills and so would seem to capture the range of language ability more comprehensively than direct observation. The findings have implications for developing parent report measures of early language development in highly inflected languages.
from First Language
Rebalancing the commissural system: Mechanisms of vestibular compensation
Vestibular compensation after unilateral vestibular loss is a complex, multi-factored process involving synaptic and neuronal plasticity in many areas of the brain, and it is a challenge to identify the key sites of plasticity that determine the rate and extent of behavioural recovery. Experimental evidence strongly implicates the vestibular commissural inhibitory system which links the brainstem vestibular nuclei of the two sides, both in causing the initial severe oculomotor and postural symptoms of vestibular deafferentation, and in the subsequent recovery that takes place in the early stages of compensation. Of particular interest are changes in GABAergic neurotransmission within the commissural system, and the possibility that histaminergic drugs as well as stress steroids and neurosteroids that can modulate compensation, may do so at least in part by their effects on commissural inhibition. A fuller understanding of the role of the commissural system in compensation and the effects of GABAergic neuromodulators is likely to reveal the mechanisms of action of histamine in the vestibular system and the interactions between stress, anxiety and vestibular dysfunction.
from the Journal of Vestibular Research
