The Relationship between Emotional Content and Word Processing in Normal Persian Speaking Children.

OBJECTIVES: Emotion is a key component in language processing, but emotional words processing in children is still controversial. We aimed to investigate the relationship between emotional dimensions, arousal and valence, word familiarity, comprehension, use, and emotional content recognition. Eventually, a list of emotional content words for this age was prepared in Persian. MATERIALS&METHODS: The study was conducted in selected elementary schools in Tehran, Iran from April to June 2017. Emotional words, from adult emotional words list, were categorized into 5 groups according to their arousal and valence scores, including neutral, happy, calm, anxious and sad. Evaluation of familiarity, use, comprehension and emotional content recognition of the list was conducted with a checklist in 60 first grade children by speech and language pathologist. RESULTS: Neutral words gained the highest score in familiarity, use, comprehension and emotional content recognition (the mean=0.74). Afterward, there were the emotional words with high valence, calm (the mean=0.64) and happy (the mean=0.52). Finally, it was found the low score for valence emotional words, sad (the mean=0.46) anxious (the mean =0.43) in end of score rating. There was a significant difference between all word groups in four aspects (P-value<0.001). There were no significant differences between boys and girls in four aspects. CONCLUSION: Neutral words are better comprehended and expressed than emotional words. Valence is more effective than arousal in emotional words. Gender was not a determinant factor in all of the aspects. An emotional word list which is comprehensible for children in Persian language was prepared.

The effect of bilateral subthalamic nucleus deep brain stimulation (STN-DBS) on the acoustic and prosodic features in patients with Parkinson's disease: A study protocol for the first trial on Iranian patients.

Background: The effect of subthalamic nucleus deep brain stimulation (STN-DBS) on the voice features in Parkinson's disease (PD) is controversial. No study has evaluated the voice features of PD underwent STN-DBS by the acoustic, perceptual, and patientbased assessments comprehensively. Furthermore, there is no study to investigate prosodic features before and after DBS in PD. The current study aimed to assess the efficacy of STN-DBS on the voice and prosodic features by acoustic, perceptual and self-reported evaluations in PD. Methods and Analysis: An experimental prospective cohort pretest-posttest group has been designed to survey patients with PD candidates for STN-DBS surgery. All participants will be evaluated by a speech and language pathologist before and after surgery in four different conditions as follow: pre-surgery: Medication On/ Medication Off; post-surgery: Stimulation On/ Stimulation Off. To compare pre-surgery and post-surgery conditions paired- samples T Test or Wilcoxon signed-rank test will be used. A 95% confidence interval (p value of <0.05) will be considered to be statistically significant. This study protocol is approved by the Ethical Committee of Teheran University of Medical Sciences, and the results of the study will be published in a peer-reviewed journal and presented at national congresses.

Relationship Between Voice and Motor Disabilities of Parkinson's Disease.

To evaluate voice of Iranian patients with Parkinson's disease (PD) and find any relationship between motor disabilities and acoustic voice parameters as speech motor components. We evaluated 27 Farsi-speaking PD patients and 21 age- and sex-matched healthy persons as control. Motor performance was assessed by the Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale part III and Hoehn and Yahr rating scale in the "on" state. Acoustic voice evaluation, including fundamental frequency (f0), standard deviation of f0, minimum of f0, maximum of f0, shimmer, jitter, and harmonic to noise ratio, was done using the Praat software via /a/ prolongation. No difference was seen between the voice of the patients and the voice of the controls. f0 and its variation had a significant correlation with the duration of the disease, but did not have any relationships with the Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale part III. Only limited relationship was observed between voice and motor disabilities. Tremor is an important main feature of PD that affects motor and phonation systems. Females had an older age at onset, more prolonged disease, and more severe motor disabilities (not statistically significant), but phonation disorders were more frequent in males and showed more relationship with severity of motor disabilities. Voice is affected by PD earlier than many other motor components and is more sensitive to disease progression. Tremor is the most effective part of PD that impacts voice. PD has more effect on voice of male versus female patients.

Relation between Voice Handicap Index (VHI) and disease severity in Iranian patients with Parkinson's disease.

BACKGROUND: One third of patients with Parkinson's disease (PD) have mentioned "dysphonia" as their most debilitating communication deficit. Patient-based measurements, such as Voice Handicap Index (VHI) add necessary supplementary information to clinical and physiological assessment. There are a few studies about relation between VHI and disease severity in PD, although none of them showed any significant correlation. The goal of this study was to find correlation between these variables in Iranian PD patients. METHOD: This cross-sectional, analytical and non-interventional study was done on 23 PD patients who reported a voice disorder related to their disease. They were selected from attendants of movement disorders clinic of Hazrat Rasool Akram Hospital. The relationship between disease severity (according to Hoehn and Yahr/H&Y and Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale-part3 /UPDRS-III) and VHI questionnaire (and its 3 domains) was investigated based on patients' sex, UPDRS-III score H&Y and VHI. RESULTS: Total VHI and its 3 domains had no relationship with disease severity (H&Y) in all patients and by sex separation. However, there was a positive correlation between VHI and disease severity (UPDRS-III) (r = 0.485). There was also a relation between physical and functional domains of VHI and UPDRS (rP=0.530, rF=0.479) while no relationship observed regarding sex differences. 9 out of 18 UPDRS-III items had strong relationship with VHI (total and 3subscales). CONCLUSION: Iranian PD patients feel handicap according to voice disorder caused by PD. Patient satisfaction of voice decreases with the disease severity and progression. A larger sample size is necessary to find relationship in genders. VHI is an important issue could be offered to be used in PD beside other assessments.