Research On The Speech Intelligibility And Speech Subsystem Characteristics Of School Age Spastic Cerebral Palsy Children And The Correlation Between Them

Because of the existence of neurological lesions, Cerebral palsy children speech intelligibility is relatively poor, which cause their terrible communication with others. However, most of the speech intelligibility assessment materials in our country are for consonant in single word, lack of assessment materials for vowels or for target phonemes in sentence; Domestic researchs of cerebral palsy childrens’speech intelligibility characteristics mainly focuses on consonants in single word, lack of researchs on vowels or target phonemes in sentence; sentence condition is more like daily speech, can better reflect the real speech condition, so research on target phonemes in sentence is needful;In addition, domestic scholars have never explored the relationship between three speech subsystems and speech intelligibility systematically, this is not conducive to guide speech therapists develop a comprehensive intervention strategy of speech intelligibility problem for cerebral palsy children.This paper is aimed at adapting assessment materials, analysis consonants and vowels intelligibility characteristics both in word and sentence of spasm cerebral palsy children,and explore the relationship between speeh subsystem and speech intelligibility.The main results of this paper are as follows:1. The adaption of intelligibility test materialAdapt the intelligibility test material base on Qiaoyun Liu’s intelligibility assessment materials sing, aim at creating a intelligibility test material for vowels and consonants both in word and in sentence.2. Consonants intelligibility characteristics of spasm cerebral palsy children(1) The overall consonants accuracy of cerebral palsy children is significan tly less than normal children’s; (2) Cerebral palsy children’s consonants with lo w accuracy both in word and sentence included:/s/,/sh/,/l/,/z/,/zh/,/c/,/q/,/ch/,/x/,/ r/,/t/,/sh/; (3)There are no significant difference between cerebral palsy children’ s consonants overall accuracy in word and that in sentence,but/ch/,/n/,/b/’s con sonants accuracy in word is greater than in sentence.3. Vowels intelligibility characteristics of spasm cerebral palsy children(1) The overall vowels accuracy of cerebral palsy children is significantly less than normal children’s; (2) Cerebral palsy children’s vowels with low accu racy both in word and sentence included:/ing/,/eng/,/en/,/uai/,/uen/,/uang/,/ueng/,/ er/,/un/,/uan/,/iou/,/uo/,/uan/,/in/.(3) There are no significant difference between c erebral palsy children’s consonants overall accuracy, distortion rate,omission rate and adding rate in word and those in sentence, overall substitution rate in sen tence is significantly greater than that in word,but /iao/ s consonants accuracy in word is significantly greater than in sentence.4. The correlation between three speech subsystem function characteristics and speech intelligibility of spasm cerebral palsy children(1) Cerebral palsy children’s respiratory support ability, breath control ability are significantly worse than normal children’s, and those ability exist moderate correlation with speech intelligibility; (2) The stability and regularity of cerebral palsy children’s vocal cords vibration are poorer than normal children’s, but those ability exist no correlation with speech intelligibility; (3) Cerebral palsy children’s tongue exist after shrinkage problems, and with insufficient shut degree when produce high vowels; And tongue and jaw movement conditions respectively exist weak and moderate positive correlation with speech intelligibility; (4) The flexibility and accuracy of articulation organ are far worse than normal children’s,and those ability exist strong positive correlation with speech intelligibility; (5) Velopharyngeal closure ability of cerebral palsy children exist no significant difference with normal children’s, but this ability of cerebral palsy children exist weak correlation with their speech intelligibility.5. Advices for the rehabilitation of cerebral palsy children’s speech int elligibility problemWhen deal with speech intelligibility problems of cerebral palsy children,we should also pay attention to the training of respiratory system, resonance system and articulation system, and should train from easy phonemes to difficult ones.