Operation of the auditory feedback monitoring loop in children with articulatory defects.

This study constitutes a preliminary evaluation of the utilization of auditory feedback for the acquisition of normal speech in normal speaking children and children having functional articulatory errors. The degree to which this is utilized for the organization and control of motor activity was inferred by delaying auditory feedback in time and quantitating the resulting disturbances in the speech behaviour. Evidence was found to support the following hypotheses: I. There is a breakdown of speech under DAF. 2: Children with multiple articulatory disorders exhibit less severe breakdown effects under DAF than their normal peers. 3. There appears to be a strong relationship between increasing age and articulatory ability. 4. There tends to be a relationship between increasing age and the breakdown of speech under DAF. 5. Monitoring of speech is a highly skilled control system which tends to develop with age and experience, and is not operating as strongly in the child with articulation-defects. From the results of the study, it seems that the auditory feedback monitoring loop for speech is not operating as successfully in the child with multiple articulatory errors as it operates in the normal child, and that the development of a closed loop system appears to be retarded in some way.