A Survey of Speech Perception Tests for Children with Hearing Loss Used in Cochlear Implant Centers in Korea / 대한이비인후과학회지

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Various speech perception tests have been developed for children with hearing loss (HL) in Korea, although they are not standardized yet. This study aims to examine the actual condition of speech perception tests for children with HL in Korea. SUBJECTS AND METHOD: Survey questionnaires and speech perception tests for children with HL were collected from 24 cochlear implant (CI) centers between March and July 2009. The speech perception tests were classified according to target ages, speech stimulus levels, and response formats. We interviewed speech therapists who had developed monosyllabic word (MW) tests, and gathered source materials, considerations, and limitations of the MW tests. We also analyzed vocabulary familiarity and phonetic balancing of words in the most commonly used MW tests. RESULTS: Thirty-eight kinds of speech perception tests for children with HL were collected from 24 CI centers. Among these tests, open-set MW tests and sentence tests were used in all centers. Speech therapists responsible for developing MW tests had selected words from textbooks, storybooks, and spontaneous speech data to secure vocabulary familiarity and phonetic balancing within each list. Four commonly used MW tests revealed that vocabulary familiarity was compatible with commonly used MW in preschoolers and demonstrated a similar trend in phoneme frequencies. CONCLUSION: The results of this study showed that current speech perception tests for children with HL should be verified, revised, and standardized in an experimental setting.

Open-Set Monosyllabic Speech Perception Test for Preschool Children / 대한이비인후과학회지

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: An open-set monosyllabic speech perception test is necessary, not only to devise habilitation programs but to select candidates and estimate performance in pediatric cochlear implant program. The purpose of this study is to develop a validated open-set monosyllabic speech perception test for preschool children. SUBJECTS AND METHOD: Qualitative test development was based on vocabulary familiarity, syllabic and phonemic frequency, and phonetic balancing between the lists. The devised test lists were applied to 138 normal hearing children and 46 children with cochlear implant to examine the validity and reliability. RESULTS: The final two test lists were made up of 100 items with 260 phonemics. The consequential validity of this devised test was proven by the applied results that the speech perception score of children with implanted devices was significantly lower than that of normal children, when controlling for the length of auditory experience. CONCLUSION: The developed monosyllabic speech perception test is the validated instrument for preschool children. It is sensitive to perceptual characteristics of articulatory function in cochlear implanted children. The validity of this test needs to be enhanced by clinical application and further item analysis.