Definitions
The most basic categories that might be drawn in issues of communication involve hearing, speech, language, and fluency. Here, hearing will be excluded from our discussion as it is the focus of experts in other domains. Speech is the first category, and it includes articulation and voice. Articulation refers to the sounds, syllables, and phonology produced by the individual. Voice, however, may refer to the characteristics of the sounds produced—specifically, the pitch, quality, and intensity of the sound. Oftentimes, fluency will also be considered a category under speech, encompassing the characteristics of rhythm, rate, and emphasis of the sound produced
The language category is slightly more difficult to define, as its properties are more abstract. Two distinctions that might be drawn are both form and function. Form includes the characteristics of grammar, morphology, and syntax. Function includes the characteristics of semantics and pragmatics.
There a variety of major speech disorders. Following are brief definitions of several of the more prominent speech disorders:
- Apraxia of speech refers specifically to a motor speech disorder. This is a neurological disorder. Individuals suffering from apraxia of speech encounter difficulty saying sounds, syllables, and words. The difficulties are not due to weakness of muscles, but rather on coordination between the brain and the specific parts of the body.
- Dysarthria is another motor speech disorder that results from a neurological injury. Some stem from central damage, while other stem from peripheral nerve damage. Difficulties may be encountered in respiratory problems, vocal fold function, or velopharyngeal closure, for example.
- Orofacial myofunctional disorder refers to problems encountered when the tongue thrusts forward inappropriately during speech. While this is typical in infants, most children outgrow this. Children that continue to exaggerate the tongue movement may incorrectly produce speech sounds, such as /s/, /z/, “sh”, “ch”, and “j”. For example, the word, “some,” might be pronounced as “thumb”.
- Speech sound disorders may be of two varieties: articulation (the production of sounds) or phonological processes (sound patterns). An articulation disorder may take the form of substitution, omission, addition, or distortion of normal speech sounds. Phonological process disorders may involve more systematic difficulties with the production of particular types of sounds, such as those made in the back of the mouth, like “k” and “g”.
- Stuttering is a disruption in the fluency of an individual’s speech, which begins in childhood and may persist over a lifetime. Stuttering is a form of disfluency; disfluency becomes a problem insofar as it impedes successful communication between two parties. Disfluencies may be due to unwanted repetitions of sounds, or extension of speech sounds, syllables, or words. Disfluencies also incorporate unintentional pauses in speech, in which the individual is unable to produce speech sounds.
- Voice problems range from aphonia (loss of phonation) to dysphonia, which may be phonatory and/or resonance disorders. Phonatory characteristics could include breathiness, hoarseness, harshness, intermittency, pitch, etc. Resonance characteristics refer to overuse or underuse of the resonance chambers resulting in hypernasality or hyponasality. Several examples of voice problems are vocal cord nodules or polyps, vocal cord paralysis, paradoxical vocal fold movement, and spasmodic dysphonia. Vocal cord nodules and polyps are different phenomena, but both may be caused by vocal abuse, and both may take the form of growths, bumps, or swelling on the vocal cords. Vocal fold paralysis is the inability to move one or both of the vocal cords, which results in difficulties with voice and perhaps swallowing. Paradoxical vocal fold movement occurs when the vocal cords close when they should actually be open. Spasmodic dysphonia is caused by strained vocal cord movement, which results in awkward voice problems, such as jerkiness or quavering.
A language disorder is an impairment in the ability to understand and/or use words in context, both verbally and nonverbally. Some characteristics of language disorders include improper use of words and their meanings, inability to express ideas, inappropriate grammatical patterns, reduced vocabulary and inability to follow directions. One or a combination of these characteristics may occur in children who are affected by language learning disabilities or developmental language delay. Children may hear or see a word but not be able to understand its meaning. They may have trouble getting others to understand what they are trying to communicate. Several of the language disorders are:
- Language-based learning disabilities , which refer to difficulties with reading, spelling, and/or writing that are evidenced in a significant lag behind the individual’s same-age peers. Most children with these disabilities are at least of average intelligence, ruling out intellectual impairments as the causal factor.
- Selective mutism is a disorder that manifests as a child that does not speak in at least one social setting, despite being able to speak in other situations. Selective mutism is normally discovered when the child first starts school.
- Aphasia refers to a family of language disorders that usually stem from injury or lesion to the left side of the brain that result in reception, perception, and recall of language; in addition, language formation and expressive capacities may be inhibited.
History
Most point to 1925 and the forming of the organization that would become American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) as the birth of speech-language pathology, but many trends worked to produce this organization, and therefore, the history of the study of speech and language disorders impairments predates 1925. Several such trends were exhibited even in the 19th century. Some have indicated the importance of elocution training in the early 19th century, through which individuals would seek out those with training to improve their vocal qualities. In the mid 19th century, the scientific endeavors of such individuals as Charles Darwin gave rise to more systematic and scientific consideration of physical phenomenon, and the work of others, such as Paul Broca and Charles Wernicke, also lent scientific rigor to the study of speech and language disorders. The late 19th century saw an increase in “pre-professionals,” those who offered speech and language services based upon personal experiences or insights.
The twentieth century has been proposed to be composed of four major periods: Formative Years, Processing Period, Linguistic Era, and Pragmatics Revolution. The Formative Years, which began around 1900 and ended around WWII, was a time during which the scientific rigor extended and professionalism entered the picture. During this period, the first school-based program began in the U.S. (1910) and the AHSA was also formed. The Processing Period, from roughly 1945-1965, further developed the assessment and interventions available for general communication disorders; much of these focused on the internal, psychological transactions involved in the communication process. During the Linguistic Era, from about 1965-1975, professionals began to separate language deficits from speech deficits, which had major implications for diagnosis and treatment of these communication disorders. Lastly, the Pragmatics Revolution has continued to shape the professional practice by considering major ecological factors, such as culture, in relation to speech and language impairments. It was during this period that IDEA was passed, and this allowed professionals to begin working with a greater scope and to increase the diversity of problems with which they concerned themselves.
Diagnostic criteria
Speech and language disorders commonly include communication issues, but also extend into various areas such as oral-motor function—sucking, swallowing, drinking, or eating. In some cases, a child's communication is delayed considerably behind his/her same-aged peers. The effects of these disorders can range from basic difficulties in the production of certain letter sounds to more comprehensive inabilities to generate (expressive) or understand (receptive) language. In most cases, the causal factors that create these speech and language difficulties are unknown. There are a wide variety of biological and environmental causal factors that can create them, ranging from drug abuse to neurological issues. For more information on causal hypotheses, refer to the section on models.
Under IDEA 2004, the federal government has defined a speech or language impairment as "a communication disorder such as stuttering, impaired articulation, a language impairment, or a voice impairment, which adversely affects a child's learning." In order to qualify in the educational system as having a speech or language impairment, the child's speech must be either unintelligible much of the time or he/she must have been professionally diagnosed by a as having either a speech impairment or language delay which requires intervention. Additionally, IDEA 2004 contains an exclusionary clause that stipulates that a speech or language impairment may not be either cultural, ethnic, bilingual, or dialectical differences in language, temporary di
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Preschool Language Scale Receptive-Expressive Emergent Language Test--2nd Ed. Rossetti Infant-Toddler Language Scale
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Verizon Life Span Literacy Matrix: Children*s Early Literacy Measures Test — Rossetti Infant-Toddler Language Scale Author — Rossetti, L. (1990).
ACF OPRE: Performance Measures for Head Start Programs ...
Description: The Rossetti Infant-Toddler Language Scale assesses the language skills of children from birth through 3 years of age.
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This resource describes the Rossetti Infant-Toddler Language Scale, which assesses preverbal and verbal areas of gesture, pragmatics, interaction and....
Rossetti Infant-Toddler Language Scale
American Speech-Language-Hearing Association Making effective communication, a human right, accessible and achievable for all.
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Dr. Rossetti has worked with parents of young children for many years and is the author of the Rossetti Infant-Toddler Language Scale, the most widely used communication scale in ...
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Preschool Language Scale Receptive-Expressive Emergent Language Test--2nd Ed. Rossetti Infant-Toddler Language Scale Temperament and Atypical Behavior Scale
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He is the author of the Rossetti Infant-Toddler Language Scale, the most widely used communication assessment scale for children under three years of age in the world.
The Rossetti Infant-Toddler Language Scale By Louis ...
Use this test to help identify preverbal and verbal language development problems in infants to three-year-olds and to provide essential information to early intervention team ...