Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2007, Graduate School

Committee: Not Provided (Other) Subjects:

PhD, University of Cincinnati, 2024, Engineering and Applied Science: Biomedical Engineering

Ultrasound imaging provides tongue shape information useful for remediating speech sound disorders, which affect 5% of children and cause long-term deficits in social health and employment in adulthood. However, ultrasound imaging can be difficult to interpret for clinicians and individuals, limiting the understanding of articulatory data and ultrasound biofeedback therapy speech outcomes. This dissertation includes three studies that use different approaches to address and investigate guidelines for improving interpretation of tongue articulation in ultrasound images during speech production. One difficulty is that tongue shapes can be challenging to compare due to their complexity and the fast pace of articulatory movements during speech. To approach this problem, tongue movement was represented as displacement trajectories of tongue parts, and support-vector machine classification models were trained to identify patterns that differentiate accurate versus misarticulated productions of the word “are.” A linear combination of tongue dorsum and blade movement was shown to achieve a classification accuracy of 85%. The resulting simpler representation of tongue movement accuracy would aid interpretation of ultrasound images during biofeedback by allowing easy comparison to movement targets. Another source of difficulty is the articulatory information missing from ultrasound images, such as tongue tip shadowed by sublingual air or by bone, as well as possible confusion between parasagittal and midsagittal tongue contours. By using a novel approach of simulating ultrasound wave propagation in tongue shapes segmented from MRI, ultrasound images were simulated from known /r/ tongue shapes. Simulations from 23 speakers indicated that tongue shapes in the middle of the continuum between bunched and retroflex /r/ had the longest portion of anterior tongue not visible in ultrasound images. Simulations of parasagittal and midsagittal images from 10 speakers su (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: T. Douglas Mast Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Steven M. Lulich Ph.D. (Committee Member); Jing Tang Ph.D. (Committee Member); Suzanne Boyce Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Biomedical Engineering

Master of Arts (MA), Bowling Green State University, 1962, Communication Disorders

Committee: Alice Greiner (Advisor) Subjects: Speech Therapy

Master of Science (MS), Bowling Green State University, 1960, Communication Disorders

Committee: Alice Greiner (Advisor) Subjects: Education; Speech Therapy

Master of Arts (MA), Bowling Green State University, 1960, Communication Disorders

Committee: Melvin Hyman (Advisor) Subjects: Speech Therapy

Master of Science (MS), Bowling Green State University, 1953, Communication Disorders

Committee: Alice Greiner (Advisor) Subjects: Speech Therapy

Master of Science (MS), Bowling Green State University, 1960, Communication Disorders

Committee: Alice Greiner (Advisor) Subjects: Education; Speech Therapy

Master of Arts (MA), Bowling Green State University, 1960, Communication Disorders

Committee: Melvin Hyman (Advisor) Subjects: Speech Therapy

Master of Science (MS), Bowling Green State University, 1956, Communication Disorders

Committee: Eugene Batza (Advisor) Subjects: Speech Therapy

Master of Science (MS), Bowling Green State University, 1953, Communication Disorders

Committee: Alice Greiner (Advisor) Subjects: Speech Therapy

Doctor of Philosophy, Case Western Reserve University, 2018, Communication Sciences

Purpose: Although most children with speech sound disorders are able to remediate their errors, some individuals have errors that persist into late childhood and even adulthood. These individuals are considered to have residual speech sound errors (RSSEs), and they are at risk for social, academic, and employment difficulties. Most individuals with RSSEs have participated in years of traditional speech therapy with little success. Visual biofeedback provides an alternative method of treatment that may be what finally allows these individuals to remediate their errors. This study utilized Opti-Speech, a visual biofeedback software that uses electromagnetic articulography to create a threedimensional rendering of the tongue that moves in real time with the participant's own tongue, for the remediation of RSSEs. Method: This single subject multiple baseline design included 18 participants (11 males and 7 females) who ranged from 8 -22 years of age. Speech sounds addressed in treatment included "r", "s", "sh", "ch", and "l". Participants attended an average of three baseline sessions and ten treatment sessions that utilized Opti-Speech visual biofeedback, and returned for a two-month follow-up. Results: Perceptual measures were based on generalization to untreated words. Eleven of the 18 participants were able to make clinically significant improvements for their target sound by their final treatment session, and 11 of 16 participants who returned for follow19 up measures had made clinically significant improvement on their target sound. When final session perceptual ratings were compared to follow-up, eight of the nine participants who presented with clinically significant improvement for their target sound were able to maintain their progress or presented with significantly improved speech sound skills. However, generalization was not seen at the sentence level. When considered as a group, clinically significant improvements were seen overal (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Jennell Vick Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Barbara Lewis Ph.D. (Committee Member); Elizabeth Short Ph.D. (Committee Member); Gregory Lee Ph.D. (Committee Member); Parrill Fey Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Speech Therapy

Master of Arts, Case Western Reserve University, 2018, Communication Sciences

Objective: The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of utterance length and utterance position on proportion of errors on voiced-th (/ð/) by preschool-age children with speech sound disorders (SSD). Method: Productions of /ð/ in spontaneous language samples from 20 children with SSD were categorized as correct or in error. These productions were pooled to determine patterns of proportions of errors across utterance lengths and positions. Results: A greater proportion of productions of /ð/ in error were found in 8-morpheme utterances than in 3-morpheme utterances. A gradual increase in proportion of errors was observed in productions of /ð/ occurring in utterance-medial positions. Conclusions: Some support was found for utterance length effects on articulation and stronger support was found for utterance position effects. Utterance length and position should receive consideration by SLPs in the assessment and treatment of preschool children with SSD.

Committee: Barbara Lewis Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Lisa Freebairn M.A. (Committee Member); Vera Tobin Ph.D. (Committee Member); Jennell Vick Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Speech Therapy

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 1987, Graduate School

Committee: Not Provided (Other) Subjects: Health Sciences