Understanding  linguis.c  complexity  of  sentence  recogni.on  tasks:  Implica.ons  for    preschool  popula.ons    

Kris.na  Blaiser,  PhD,  CCC-­‐SLP;    Abbie  Olszewski,  MA,  CCC-­‐SLP;  &  Elizabeth  Preston,  AuD,  CCC-­‐A  Utah  State  University  

Background:  The  purpose  of  sentence  recogni.on  tes.ng  is  to  determine  a  child’s  ability  to  hear  and  understand  everyday  speech.      •  Sentence  recogni.on  tasks  are  helpful  in  discovering  a  child’s  difficul.es  and  in  developing  appropriate  goals  and  objects  for  the  child  (Madell,  1998).      

•  By  using  sentences,  versus  a  single  word  list,  results  are  more  realis.c  and  reflect  listening  in  everyday  situa.ons.      

•  It  is  recommended  that  an  audiologist  ensure  that  a  child  has  “sufficient  cogni.ve  and  linguis.c  skills”  (Waltzman  &  Cohen,  2000)  to  par.cipate  in  sentence-­‐based  speech  percep.on  tasks.  

 Research  Ques2ons:  1.  What  is  the  linguis.c  complexity  of  commonly  used  sentence  recogni.on  tasks?  2.  Does  this  help  to  inform  audiologists  about  when/how  to  use  specific  tasks  for  

pediatric  popula.ons?  3.  How  do  sentence-­‐based  auditory  tasks  compare  to  informa.on  gained  from  commonly  

used  language  assessments?  

Results:      

HINT-­‐C  “A/The  boy  fell  from  the  window.”  “A/The  lady  went  to  the  store.”    

COMMON  PHRASES  “What  color  are  your  eyes?”      “It's  nice  to  meet  you.”    

GASP  “What  is  your  name?”    

“What  color  are  your  shoes?”    

BKB  “They  carried  some  shopping  bags.”  

 “They  laughed  at  his  story.”  

Sentence  Recogni2on  Test   Age   Task   Language  Elements   Recommenda2ons  

Common  Phrases    

(Robbins,  Renshaw,  &  Osberger,  1995)  

4-­‐8  years  

-­‐Repeat  sentences  -­‐Live  voice  -­‐Quiet    

Some  complex  determiners  (your);  early  adjec2ves  (nice),  common  nouns  (eyes,  clothes),  present  progressive  verbs;  (are  going);  no  adverbs;  no  conjunc.ons;  early  morphemes  (contracted  copula,  present  progressive).    

1.  Linguis.cally,  the  simplest  test  of  the  ones  analyzed.    

2.  Would  be  a  good  baseline  sentence  recogni.on  task.    

3.  Could  give  to  children  younger  than  4  years.  

 

GASP                                                        (Erber,  1982)  

Unknown  -­‐Repeat  or  answer  ques.on    

Some  complex  determiners  (your);  no  adjec.ves;  uses  more  sophis.cated  preposi2on  (aDer);  copula  verb;  more  complex  preposi2on  (aDer),  uses  more  sophis2cated  morphemes  (3rd  person  singular,  plural  -­‐s)  

1.  All  “Wh”  ques.ons.  Child  must  be  able  to  understand  and/or  answer  ques.ons.  

2.  Children  with  limited  access  to  high  frequencies  may  have  some  difficulty  with  the  morphemes  used  (plural  –s  &  3rd  person  singular).  

3.  Could  give  to  children  4  years  and  higher.  

BKB  (Etymo.c  Research,  2005)  

5-­‐14  years  

-­‐Repeat  sentences  -­‐Recorded  or  live  voice  -­‐Quiet  or  noise    

 Complex  determiners  (some,  his,  her);  complex  adjec2ves  (shopping,  asleep);  regular  and  irregular  past  tense  verbs  (carried,  drove);  use  of  early  preposi2ons  (up,  at),  and  complex  morphemes  (plural  –s,  regular  past  tense)  were  used.  

1.  Some  use  of  past  tense  verbs  and  morphemes.    

2.  This  test  could  be  used  for  children  who  have  language  levels  of  4  years  and  higher.    

HINT-­‐C    (Bio-­‐logic  Systems  Corp,  

2005)    

6-­‐12  years    

-­‐Repeat  sentences  -­‐Recorded  or  live  voice  -­‐Quiet  or  noise    

 Many  complex  determiners  (her,  his,  their)  used;  many  adjec2ves  (big,  dangerous);  early  nouns  (boy,  dog,  shoes);  use  of  irregular  and  regular  past  tense  verbs  (helped,  came);  preposi2ons  are  more  complex  (from);    and  complex  morphemes  (plural  –s,  contracted  copula)  were  used.    

1.  More  complex  language  used  in  this  test.  Past  tense  is  used  in  almost  every  sentence.    

2.  Would  be  a  good  ongoing  measure  for  children  with  more  developed  language.    

3.  Would  be  beier  used  for  children          who  are  late  preschool  (5  &  6  years  old)  or  early  elementary  school.    

 

Discussion:  •  Increased  understanding  of  the  linguis.c  complexity  of  sentence  recogni.on  tasks  may  help  audiologists  to  

recognize  if  the  task  is  tes.ng  the  child’s  auditory  percep.on  skills  or  language  development.      •  Audiologists  and  speech-­‐language  pathologists  can  work  together  to  ensure  that  tes.ng  is  appropriate  for  a  child’s  

developmental/language  level.    

Figure  2.  The  following  linguis.c  elements:  adverbs,  morphemes,  ar.cles  (a/the),  wh-­‐  ques.ons,  and  pronouns  may  be  par.cularly  challenging  for  children  with  hearing  loss  and  have  been  analyzed  in  more  detail.    

Figure  1.    Total  percentage  of  each  part  of  speech  for  four  common  speech  recogni.on  tests  administered  to  children  with  hearing  loss.    Sample  ques.ons  from  each  test  are  also  presented.  

Table  1  Speech  RecogniNon  Task  DescripNon  and  RecommendaNons  Listed  in  Language  Complexity  Order    

Determiners,  27%  

Adjec.ves,  7%  

Pronouns,  15%  Nouns,  27%  

Verbs,  17%  

Conjunc.ons,  0%  

Preposi.ons,  5%   Adverbs,  2%  

Determiners,  11%  

Adjec.ves,  6%  

Pronouns,  22%  

Nouns,  19%  

Verbs,  39%  

Conjunc.ons,  0%  

Preposi.ons,  0%  

Adverbs,  3%  

Determiners  23%  

Adjec.ves  9%  

Pronouns  10%  Nouns  

25%  

Verbs  22%  

Conjunc.ons  0%  

Preposi.ons  8%  

Adverbs  3%  

Determiners  25%  

Adjec2ves  0%  

Pronouns  16%  

Nouns  24%  

Verbs  22%  

Conjunc2ons  0%  Preposi2ons  

4%  

Adverbs  9%  

0  

2  

4  

6  

8  

10  

Adverbs   Morphemes   Ar.cles   Wh-­‐  Ques.ons   Pronouns  

Common  BKB  HINTC  GASP