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Purpose: A hallmark of autistic spectrum disorder (ASD) is disruption in theory-of-mind development, including the understanding of false beliefs. Previous studies have typically assessed the development of first- and second-order false belief concepts in ASD, with tasks primarily emphasizing physical causality and logical inferencing. The present study investigated how preadolescents and adolescents with ASD performed on false belief tasks that included social inferencing of psychological states as well as logical inferencing of physical states.Method: Two categories of tasks were administered: four traditional logical inferencing tasks and four social inferencing tasks specifically developed for this study. In addition, a prompt hierarchy was included to ascertain if performance on both task types improved. Participants were 45 children and adolescents primarily selected from three urban school districts: 15 adolescents with a previous diagnosis of ASD (ASD group); 15 typically developing children matched for age, gender, and ethnicity (CA group); and 15 typically developing children matched for language age, gender, and ethnicity (LA group).Results: Three findings were pertinent. First, the CA group performed at higher levels than did the LA group and the ASD group on both task sets. Second, although the CA and the LA groups performed equally well on both the logical and the social inferencing tasks, the ASD group performed better on the social inferencing tasks. Finally, the prompt hierarchy significantly improved overall task performance for the ASD and LA groups.Clinical Implications: These findings indicate that task type, variations in vocabulary ability, and the provision of support influenced performance on the false belief tasks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: To examine how well hearing aid orientation (HAO) content is remembered immediately and 1 month after the HAO, and whether the ability to remember this information differs as a function of the audiologist providing the information, patient's age, degree of hearing loss, and prior knowledge of hearing aids., Method: A convenience sample of 100 older adults completed a multiple-choice test of hearing aid knowledge immediately following the HAO and 1 month later. Covariate and regression analyses were used to address the study purpose., Results: On average, participants recognized 74% of the information immediately following HAO and 78% at 1 month. Hearing loss was associated with declining recognition for hearing aid use and care information immediately following HAO, whereas prior knowledge was associated with successful recognition. Participants who recognized more HAO content immediately also remembered more at 1 month. A difference in recognition of hearing aid information based on audiologist was suggested immediately following HAO, but there were no differences at 1 month. Ability to recognize HAO content was not related to age of participants., Conclusions: On average, participants recognized approximately 75% of the HAO content, which is encouraging from a clinical standpoint, providing support for the efficacy of the HAO and the time audiologists spend in completing it. Moreover, recognition of HAO content improved when tested at 1 month, suggesting audiologists may expect their patients to be aware of a majority of hearing aid use and care information following the hearing aid trial period.

Purpose: A hallmark of autistic spectrum disorder (ASD) is disruption in theory-of-mind development, including the understanding of false beliefs. Previous studies have typically assessed the development of first- and second-order false belief concepts in ASD, with tasks primarily emphasizing physical causality and logical inferencing. The present study investigated how preadolescents and adolescents with ASD performed on false belief tasks that included social inferencing of psychological states as well as logical inferencing of physical states., Method: Two categories of tasks were administered: four traditional logical inferencing tasks and four social inferencing tasks specifically developed for this study. In addition, a prompt hierarchy was included to ascertain if performance on both task types improved. Participants were 45 children and adolescents primarily selected from three urban school districts: 15 adolescents with a previous diagnosis of ASD (ASD group); 15 typically developing children matched for age, gender, and ethnicity (CA group); and 15 typically developing children matched for language age, gender, and ethnicity (LA group)., Results: Three findings were pertinent. First, the CA group performed at higher levels than did the LA group and the ASD group on both task sets. Second, although the CA and the LA groups performed equally well on both the logical and the social inferencing tasks, the ASD group performed better on the social inferencing tasks. Finally, the prompt hierarchy significantly improved overall task performance for the ASD and LA groups., Clinical Implications: These findings indicate that task type, variations in vocabulary ability, and the provision of support influenced performance on the false belief tasks.

Normative data, as a function of age, were obtained on a test designed to assess sensory-level speech perception capacity, the Three-Interval Forced-Choice Test of Speech Pattern Contrast Perception, otherwise known as THRIFTSPAC (or THRIFT for short). Performance under the input modalities of hearing alone, speech-reading alone, and the two combined was measured in 44 normally developing children between the ages of 5 years 7 months and 10 years 9 months. Results revealed that within each condition there were significant influences of age on performance for children below age 7 years. These changes appeared to be related to cognitive and, possibly, to phonological development. Implications for the clinical implementation of THRIFT are discussed.

The effects of acoustic/linguistic complexity of training stimuli (i.e., isolated words vs. words in sentences) on speech perception performance was measured in 17 young children (four-to-eight years old) with severe-to-profound sensorineural hearing losses. Phase I of the study involved training on isolated words (n = 9), while Phase II involved training on words in sentences (n = 8). A four-week period of experimental training was counterbalanced with a four-week period of traditional speech-language therapy across participants and Phases. Pre- and post-treatment testing was conducted for both words in isolation and in sentences at the end of each period. Significant improvements were found as a result of experimental training in both phases. Evidence of transfer of learning was greater when sentence level stimuli (Phase II) rather than isolated word stimuli were used (Phase I). Clinical implications are discussed.

Objectives: To determine the prevalence and characteristics of hearing loss in patients undergoing examination because of a memory disorder, to determine whether currently used screening tools were adequate for use in this specific population, and to determine if patients with Alzheimer disease reliably report hearing problems., Design: Case-control study., Patients: A consecutive sample of 52 patients: 30 patients who met the National Institute of Neurological and Communicative Disorders and Stroke/Alzheimer's Disease and Related Disorders Association criteria for probable Alzheimer disease (group 1) and 22 patients with other forms of cognitive impairment (group 2)., Methods: Patients underwent a hearing screening that included a case history, a visual inspection of the external ear canal and tympanic membrane, and pure tone audiometry. Patients and their caregivers completed a questionnaire intended to assess hearing impairment and perceived disability., Outcome Measures: Pass or fail on pure tone audiometry and pass or fail on a hearing impairment questionnaire., Results: Of the 52 patients, 49 had significant hearing loss. No difference was found in the failure rate between patients in groups 1 and 2. In group 1, a significant discrepancy was found between the patient's self-report and that of their caregivers, whereas in group 2, the self-report was reliable. The prevalence of hearing loss in this population greatly exceeds the prevalence in healthy aged controls., Conclusion: The extraordinarily high prevalence of hearing loss in this selected population suggests that a hearing evaluation should be part of any assessment of cognitive function.

Recognition of words in sentences of known topic was measured in normally hearing adults via speechreading alone and speechreading supplemented with auditory presentation of signals intended to convey variations of voice fundamental frequency (Fo) over time. Three signals were used: (a) the low-pass filtered output of an electroglottograph (unprocessed Fo), (b) a constant amplitude sine wave whose instantaneous frequency was intended to equal that of Fo (processed Fo), and (c) the same sine wave restricted to a small number of discrete frequency steps (quantized Fo). As the number of steps in the quantized Fo contours increased from 1 to 12, the speechreading enhancement effect increased. The quantized Fo contour with 12 steps was as effective as the processed Fo contour (without quantization), but this processed contour was significantly less effective than the unprocessed electroglottograph signal. The results show that the auditory Fo speechreading enhancement effect is sensitive to the errors introduced by the Fo extraction and regeneration process used in this study. It is also sensitive to the quantization of Fo contours into less than 12 steps. Whether more than 12 steps are required for the full enhancement effect remains to be determined.

An adult with a severe, postlingually-acquired, sensorineural, hearing loss was given 2 hours a week of training in the perception of connected discourse by lipreading, supplemented by voice fundamental frequency (Fo), encoded as locus of vibratory stimulation of the forearm. Three, 3-week blocks of training in the supplemented condition were interspersed with 1-week periods of training by lipreading alone. Training was conducted via a computer-controlled, interactive video system, using a semi-automated connected discourse tracking procedure. Performance was measured as the percentage of words correctly recognized on the first presentation of new sentence material. Scores by lipreading alone averaged approximately 65 percent and remained essentially constant over the 13 weeks of training. Scores under the supplemented condition rose from 65 percent at the beginning of the study to 85 percent at the end. The final supplemented score represented roughly a 50 percent reduction of error rate, when compared with lipreading alone. Performance with the tactile supplement was not as good as with auditorily presented Fo, but was better than has previously been reported in the literature. These data provide evidence to support the notion that subjects can learn to integrate novel tactile codes with the visual stimulus during the lipreading of connected speech.