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Temporal Resolution of Auditory Perception and Verbal Working Memory in 15 Children with Language
Impairment
Fritjof Norrelgen, Francisco Lacerda and Hans Forssberg
J Learn Disabil 2002 35: 540
DOI: 10.1177/00222194020350060501

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jld-v35n6-p540 10/29/02 11:11 AM Page 540

Temporal Resolution of Auditory

Perception and Verbal Working
Memory in 15 Children with
Language Impairment
Fritjof Norrelgen, Francisco Lacerda, and Hans Forssberg

Abstract
We investigated temporal resolution of auditory perception (TRAP), verbal working memory, and speech perception in 15 children with
language impairment (LI) in comparison with a control group of 99 typical children. A computerized two-choice test was used to assess
these three abilities. No deficits in TRAP were found in the LI group, and the thresholds were similar for both study groups. It was in-
teresting that the variability was high for both groups and that the control group’s performance was poorer than reported in some pre-
viously published studies. There were significant differences in the two groups’ performance on speech perception and verbal working
memory. Working memory was the most sensitive of these two measures.

for ISIs ≥ 428 ms, but for shorter ISIs,

T
hree auditory abilities that have
raised interest in connection
with language impairment (LI)
are temporal resolution of auditory
perception (TRAP; Tallal, Miller, &
Fitch, 1993), verbal working memory
(Gathercole & Baddeley, 1990), and
speech perception (Bird & Bishop,
1992; Reynolds & Fucci, 1998).
Children with LI have been reported
to have marked deficits in their ability
to process rapid auditory events (Tallal
& Piercy, 1973; Wright et al., 1997).
Their detection thresholds for rapid
acoustic events and speech perception
have been tested by using nonverbal
stimuli (clicks or tones) and verbal
stimuli (synthetic syllables), respec-
tively. In one of the earliest experi-
ments, children with specific language
impairment (SLI) were tested in a
same–different task to determine their
ability to discriminate between two
steady-state tones presented with dif-
ferent interstimulus intervals (ISIs; Tal-
lal & Piercy, 1973). The results revealed
no difference in performance between
children with SLI and a control group
the performance of the SLI group chil-
dren lagged drastically compared to
that of the control group. This finding
led Tallal and Piercy to hypothesize
that the problems with speech percep-
tion could be the result of impaired
TRAP. An experiment was set up in
which two sets of synthetic speech
stimuli (/ba/, /da/ syllables) with
typical and prolonged critical seg-
ments were used (Tallal & Piercy, 1975;
see Note 1). The hypothesis expressed
in the first study was confirmed: The
SLI group children perceived the pro-
longed speech stimuli much better
than the stimuli with typical length of
critical segments. A conclusion of these
and other studies has been that im-
paired TRAP causes language impair-
ment (Benasich & Tallal, 1993; Tallal,
Stark, & Mellits, 1985; Tallal et al.,
1993). However, this hypothesis is con-
troversial, and others hold the view
that problems in underlying language-
specific abilities cause language im-
pairments. The late Alvin Liberman ar-
gued that perception of speech is
possible because speech is produced
and perceived as gestures or articula-
tory acts rather than as concatenated,
isolated speech sounds (Liberman,
1993). In other words, the movements of
the articulators (tongue, jaw, and lips)
during the production of fluent speech
has been demonstrated to be produced
and perceived in wide segments (artic-
ulatory acts) rather than as isolated
movements that have to be put to-
gether. This implies that TRAP is not so
important for the discrimination of
phonemes, such as the consonant in a
consonant–vowel syllable. In fact, be-
cause of the articulatory gesture, the
information about the consonant is ac-
tually spread over the entire syllable
(Diehl & Kluender, 1987). From this
point of view, it is difficult to explain
how extending the transition duration
of a consonant–vowel syllable could
dramatically improve discrimination,
as it did in Tallal and Piercy’s (1975) ex-
periment. In several studies, no deficits
in TRAP were found in SLI (Bishop,
Carlyon, Deeks, & Bishop, 1999; Hel-
zer, Champlin, & Gillam, 1996; Suss-

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VOLUME 35, NUMBER 6, NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2002, PAGES 540–546
jld-v35n6-p540 10/29/02 11:11 AM Page 541
man, 1993; Trehub & Henderson, 1996).
Recently, we investigated the relation-
ship between TRAP and language abil-
ity in 119 typical school children (Nor-
relgen, Lacerda, & Forssberg, 2001).
The results did not support a causal re-
lationship between TRAP and lan-
guage abilities in typical children. It is
possible that the discrepancy between
the results in different studies was
caused by the different types of test
methods used. However, it could be ar-
gued that if deficits in TRAP have such
severe consequences on language de-
velopment, the effect must be very ro-
bust, and a wide variety of test meth-
ods should be able to detect it. In this
study, we tested TRAP in children with
LI using a method similar to Tallal and
Piercy’s 1973 study—a forced two-
choice paradigm with two steady-state
tones, only varying the ISIs.
Another aspect that we wanted to
investigate was whether these children
had speech perception problems and,
if so, whether the perception of prob-
lematic contrasts would depend on
TRAP (i.e., if problematic contrasts
contain brief segments supposedly
critical for temporal resolution). Peo-
ple working with children with LI have
observed that they often have prob-
lems with speech perception. There are
surprisingly few studies in which this
issue has been investigated, but some
researchers have shown that children
with LI have problems in this area
(Rvachew & Jamieson, 1989; Stark &
Tallal, 1980). In this study, we applied
a method used in two earlier studies to
assess speech perception in children
(Norrelgen, Lacerda, & Forssberg,
1999, 2001).
Verbal working memory capacity
has been examined in children with LI
by using a nonword repetition task
with varying memory loads (Gather-
cole & Baddeley, 1990). Gathercole and
Baddeley found severe problems with
working memory in an LI group and
proposed that a deficit in the phono-
logical storage component of working
memory was the source of this effect.
They also proposed that this deficit
might play a central role in LI. We were
interested in assessing working mem-
VOLUME 35, NUMBER 6, NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2002
ory in children with LI in parallel with
the two auditory parameters, because
this has not been done before. It would
provide information about the distri-
bution and the degree of problems in
auditory perception in a group of chil-
dren with LI. In two earlier studies, we
used a two-alternative forced-choice
paradigm to assess verbal working
memory in children (Norrelgen et al,
1999, 2001). As children with LI fre-
quently have phonological/articula-
tory problems and often are shy about
speaking, there are possible advan-
tages to this method because the chil-
dren are not required to speak. We
wanted to see if we would get results
similar to those in Gathercole and Bad-
deley’s (1990) study with this method.
Altogether, we addressed four ques-
tions in this study on children with LI:
1. Do children with LI have a dis-
tinctly lower TRAP than typical
children?
2. Do they have problems with
speech perception?
3. If they have such problems, can the
problematic phoneme contrasts be
related to TRAP?
4. Do they have deficits in verbal
working memory?
Method
Participants
Children with LI. The LI group
consisted of 15 children from pre-
schools for children with LI in the
Stockholm area. The target group for
the language preschools are children
with moderate to severe LI without
other significant functional impair-
ments, such as hearing problems,
mental retardation, autism, attention-
deficit/hyperactivity disorder, emo-
tional disorder, or neurological disor-
der. Before entry, a speech–language
pathologist and a child psychologist
assessed the children.
The children were 5 to 7 years of age.
All of them were well known to the
teachers and the speech pathologists.
Their language status had been recently
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541
assessed because transfer to a suitable
school setting was being planned.
Of 40 children in five out of seven
language preschools, the parents of 15
children declined to participate. Of the
remaining 25 children, 15 could partic-
ipate in all three computerized tests of
TRAP, speech perception, and phono-
logical working memory (see Note 2).
This group consisted of 11 boys and 4
girls, of whom 5 were 5 years old, 8
were 6 years old, and 2 were 7 years old.
A psychologist assessed cognitive
ability in the LI group with the Leiter
International Performance Scale–Revised
(Leiter-R; Roid & Miller, 1997). Their
IQ scores were between 87 and 121
(M = 103, Mdn = 101.5, SD = 9.96).
Records from the preschool speech–
language units were scrutinized for
data on the children’s language abili-
ties according to different tests per-
formed by the speech pathologist dur-
ing the children’s preschool days. The
assessments were not uniform, but the
available data were compiled. Eleven
children had combined receptive and
expressive difficulties, 3 were charac-
terized by primarily expressive diffi-
culties, and 1 had primarily receptive
difficulties. At the latest assessment,
1 child was considered to have a mild
LI of an expressive type, and 1 child
had a mild LI of combined type. The re-
maining 13 had moderate or severe LI.
These children were also partici-
pants in another study in which data
on medical background factors had
been collected (Fernell, Norrelgen,
Bozkurt, Hellberg, & Löwing, in press).
A pediatrician examined the partici-
pant’s medical records from the child
health centers and interviewed the
parents. No child had a history of any
neurological disorder. In 7 of the chil-
dren, a definite hereditary trait for LI in
a first-degree relative was found. Thir-
teen participants were born at term
(gestational age > 37 weeks), 1 boy was
born moderately preterm (gestational
age = 35 weeks), and for an adopted
boy, the gestational age was unknown.
One mother had been treated for thy-
rotoxicosis during pregnancy. No other
pre-, peri-, or postnatal complications
were known.
jld-v35n6-p540 10/29/02 11:11 AM Page 542
542
Control Group. The control group
consisted of typical children (see Note
3) from schools and day care centers in
a socioeconomically representative
area of Stockholm. These children had
participated in an earlier study (Nor-
relgen et al., 2001). From that sample,
we selected all participants in the age
range from 6 years to 7 years (n = 74).
To match the age range of the control
group with the LI group, we collected
data from an additional 23 five-year-
olds and 2 six-year-olds (n = 25) in a
day care center from the same Stock-
holm area as the previous sample. The
control group thus consisted of 99 chil-
dren.
Auditory Test Procedure
A two-alternative forced-choice para-
digm implemented by a computer pro-
gram (Lacerda, Eismann, Öberg, &
Norrelgen, 1993) was used. The partic-
ipants sat in front of a computer screen
and wore headphones. Before the ses-
sion began, the sound volume was set
according to each participant’s request.
Stimuli were presented in pairs, and
the task was to categorize the pairs as
same pairs (e.g., /ka/, pause, /ka/) or
different pairs (e.g., /ka/, pause, /ta/).
Two knobs to signal decisions were lo-
cated in front of the participants. Cor-
rect responses were visually reinforced
by some action on the computer screen
(e.g., an animal appearing in jungle
scenery). Incorrect or missing re-
sponses produced no action on the
screen. The stimuli were presented in
random order in each test. To ensure
this, the original computer script of the
stimuli was randomized three times,
and the resulting lists were appended
to each other. This procedure guaran-
teed that no more than two identical
consecutive pairs would be presented.
Two identical consecutive pairs were
presented only if one randomized list
happened to end with the same pair
that occurred in the first position of the
next list.
Training Phase. In the training
phase, the participants learned to listen
to and compare the first and the second
JOURNAL OF LEARNING DISABILITIES
stimulus in pairs and to classify the
pairs as same pairs or different pairs.
In this training phase, the test leader
triggered the stimuli presentations
manually at a pace adjusted to each
participant. The participants had to
meet a criterion of seven correct re-
sponses within eight successive trials
before proceeding to the test. Data
from this phase were not recorded. The
stimuli used in this phase consisted of
four monosyllabic stimulus pairs—
two same pairs and two different pairs.
The target phonemes were vowels. Be-
fore the TRAP test, the child was
trained again with tone pairs of 250 ms
tones (878 and 1350 Hz) with 500 ms
ISIs.
Once the participants had passed
this stage, the tests were presented in
the same order for all participants:
1. speech perception test,
2. phonological working memory
test, and
3. TRAP test.
The test procedures in these three test
conditions were fully automated once
they had been started. A full test ses-
sion took around 45 minutes to com-
plete.
Speech Discrimination Test. To test
speech discrimination, pairs of mono-
syllables with consonant–vowel com-
binations were used. The following
contrasts were used: /pɑ/–/bɑ/, /kɑ/–
/gɑ/, /dɑ/–/gɑ/, /kɑ/–/tɑ/, /
ɑ/–
/çɑ/, /fɑ/–/sɑ/, /ɹɑ/–/lɑ/, /jɑ/–
/ɹɑ/, /stɹɑ/–/stɑ/. For the purpose of
comparison between the performance
on this test and the phonological work-
ing memory test, the same ISIs and re-
sponse times were used. In all, there
were 18 stimulus pairs presented three
times each—altogether, 54 stimulus
presentations. After each stimulus pre-
sentation, the child had a maximum re-
sponse time of 3 s. This response time
cutoff was also used in the verbal
working memory test and the TRAP
test.
Verbal Working Memory Test. The
stimuli for the working memory test
consisted of 2-, 3-, 4-, and 5-syllabic
Downloaded from ldx.sagepub.com by Maxim Andreea on October 29, 2014
pseudoword pairs (e.g., a 5-syllabic
different pair, /ki-ga-bo-ti-do/–/ki-
ga-bi-ti-do/), to enable the discrimina-
tion performance to be assessed under
increasing memory loads. Vowels were
used as target phonemes because they
are presumed to be easier to discrimi-
nate than consonants (Borden & Har-
ris, 1984), allowing us to attribute
errors in performance to memory defi-
ciency. Care was taken to minimize se-
mantic cues by avoiding similarities
with any frequently encountered Swed-
ish words, as suggested by Dollaghan,
Biber, and Campbell (1993). To prevent
the participants from developing the
strategy of always focusing on the
same syllable, target phonemes were
located in the second, third, fourth, or
fifth syllable. Contrasting phonemes
occurred in unstressed syllables. On
each block, there were 12 trials—in all,
48 trials. The stimuli were presented
with ISIs of 3 s to encourage partici-
pants to use subvocal or vocal re-
hearsal. Phonological representations
within the store are known to fade
within 2 s unless refreshed by rehearsal
(Baddeley, 1966).
TRAP Test. To test TRAP, two 20-ms-
long tones presented with varying ISIs
were used (see Note 4). The frequen-
cies of the two tones, generated by
computer, were 878 Hz and 1350 Hz. In
a first step, the tones were paired into
the four possible combinations, 878
Hz–878 Hz, 1350 Hz–1350 Hz, 878
Hz–1350 Hz , or 1350 Hz–878 Hz. The
first two pairs were defined as same
pairs and the latter two as different
pairs. In a second step, we used these
four combinations and created five
subsets with different ISIs between the
two tones: 256, 128, 64, 32, and 16 ms.
The subsets were always presented in
this order. In every subset, the stimulus
pairs were presented four times each—
altogether, 16 stimulus presentations.
The whole test thus consisted of 80
trials.
Data Analysis and Statistical
Methods
Before statistical analysis, performances
on the three auditory tests were con-
jld-v35n6-p540 10/29/02 11:11 AM Page 543
verted to d’ (d prime) scores (Kay, 1998),
as this score takes into account both
hits (i.e., correct answers on different
pairs) and false alarms (i.e., errors
on same pairs). For comparisons of
between-group differences in perfor-
mance, nonparametric statistics were
used, namely, the Mann-Whitney U
test, using 2 × 1–sided exact p values.
Results
Speech Discrimination
There was a significant difference in
overall performance between groups
on the speech discrimination test, U =
430.5, z = –2.62, p = 0.008, ES = 0.610.
The overall performance in percentage
of correct responses for the control
group was 90% (SD = 11%) and for the
LI group, 85% (SD = 12%; see Figure 1).
To examine which particular contrasts
contributed to this difference, we com-
pared the performance between groups
for each phoneme contrast separately.
This analysis revealed significant dif-
ferences for the contrasts /pa–/ba/,
U = 432.5, z = –2.9, p = .010;
/da/–/ga/, U = 439.5, z = –2.96, p =
.015; and /stra/–/sta/, U = 466.5, z =
–2.62, p = .020). There was also a ten-
dency to a systematic difference for the
contrast /fa/–/sa/, U = 529.0, z =
–2.19, p = .074.
Working Memory
There was a significant overall differ-
ence between the LI group and the con-
trol group on the verbal working mem-
ory test, U = 398, z = –2.89, p = .003,
ES = 0.685. Separate analyses of the
group differences in performance on
the four memory loads (see Figure 2)
revealed that they were all significant:
two syllables, U = 489, z = –2.20, p =
.033; three syllables, U = 450, z = –2.5,
p = .013), four syllables, U = 434, z =
–2.6, p = .009; and five syllables, U =
479, z = –2.22, p = .026. In Table 1, per-
formances on the working memory
test are shown separately for responses
to same pairs and different pairs. The
high performance on the same pairs
for both groups indicates that execu-
VOLUME 35, NUMBER 6, NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2002
tive problems or attention problems
did not cause the group differences, be-
cause such problems most likely would
have affected performance on the same
pairs as well.
TRAP
There were no significant differences
in overall performance between groups,
U = 640.5, z = –0.86, p = .396, ES = 0.204,
or in performance on any of the five in-
terstimulus intervals: 256 ms, U = 702,
z = 0.34, p = .740; 128 ms, U = 630, z =
–0.95, p = .351; 64 ms, U = 628, z = –0.96,
p = .343; 32 ms, U = 630.5, z = –0.94, p =
.351; and 16 ms, U = 654, z = –0.74, p =
.465. Table 2 shows the percentage of
correct responses by type of stimulus
(same pair vs. different pair) for each
ISI by group, and Figure 3 shows the
overall performance for each ISI.
Discussion
Our results did not reveal separate
thresholds in TRAP for the LI group
and the control group. As Figure 3
shows, the performances of the LI
group and the control group were sim-
ilar and declined steadily from around
80% correct at 256 ms ISI to around
50% at 16 ms ISI. Moreover, the pattern
of a higher performance on same pairs
than on different pairs disappeared for
both groups by the ISI of 64 ms (see
Table 2). From this lack of a response
bias and the low performances at an ISI
of 64 ms, it is evident that the TRAP
task is very difficult already at this
level for both groups. We also infor-
mally compared the performance of
our participants with that in Tallal and
Piercy’s 1973 experiment. In our exper-
iment, 47% of the children with LI and
61% of the control group reached a
score of 75% correct responses at the
128 ms ISI. At an ISI of 16 ms, the mean
scores for our LI and control groups
were 48% and 52% correct, respec-
tively. In contrast, in Tallal and Piercy’s
experiment, no participant with SLI
managed 75% correct at ISIs of 150 ms
or shorter, whereas all controls man-
aged 75% correct at an ISI of 8 ms.
Downloaded from ldx.sagepub.com by Maxim Andreea on October 29, 2014
543
FIGURE 1. Distribution of scores in
percentage of correct responses in the
speech discrimination test for the lan-
guage impairment (LI) group and the
control group. Boxes represent the 25th
to the 75th percentile scores, and error
bars represent the 5th to the 95th per-
centile. The square in each box indi-
cates the median. Outliers are repre-
sented by colored triangles and are
defined as data point values > upper
box value (UBV) + 1.5 × (UBV – LBV)
or data point values < lower box value
(LBV) – 1.5 × (UBV – LBV).
Thus, we could not replicate Tallal’s
findings, and our data do not support
the notion that children with LI have
deficits in TRAP.
A consequence of this finding is that
the problems that were found in
speech perception in the LI group
could not be explained by deficits in
TRAP. On three phoneme contrasts, we
found group differences in perfor-
mance. Two of these contrasts con-
tained segments (formant transitions)
that have been suggested to be criti-
cally dependent on TRAP (/pa/–/ba/
and /da/–/ga/), but the third contrast
(/sta/–/stra/) does not. For the con-
trast /fa/–/sa/, there was a tendency
to a group difference ( p = .07), but this
contrast does not contain any formant
transitions. In another study, it was re-
ported that children with LI had prob-
lems with discriminating contrasts
(fricatives) that did not contain for-
mant transitions (Tallal & Stark, 1981).
jld-v35n6-p540 10/29/02 11:11 AM Page 544

544 JOURNAL OF LEARNING DISABILITIES

a broad spectrum of language prob-

lems can be related to deficits in verbal
working memory. Our findings con-
firm the link between LI and working
memory problems previously reported
by others.
The finding that the verbal working
memory test could detect problems
without requiring the child to speak is
interesting. This indicates that the
method we used may well be useful for
detecting verbal working memory
problems in individuals with articula-
tion problems.
Possible confounding factors in the
three tests include fatigue, inattention
problems, and executive problems,
particularly in the LI group. Such ef-
fects could have been accentuated by
the order in which the tests were pre-
sented (i.e., TRAP, working memory,
FIGURE 2. Distribution of scores in percentage of correct responses for each speech perception). However, from our
memory load in the verbal working memory test for the language impairment (LI) pilot participants we learned that
group and the control group. Boxes represent the 25th to the 75th percentile, and TRAP was the most difficult task and
error bars represent the 5th to the 95th percentile. The symbol in each box repre- speech discrimination the easiest task.
sents the median. Outliers are represented by colored triangles and are defined as
Because we wanted to minimize fa-
data point values > upper box value (UBV) + 1.5 × (UBV – LBV) or data point val-
tigue effects in the participants’ perfor-
ues < lower box value (LBV) – 1.5 × (UBV – LBV).
mance on the whole test battery, the
children with LI were offered breaks
TABLE 1
between the three tests, which several
Correct Responses on the Verbal Working Memory Test by Memory Load, of them accepted. In the TRAP test,
Stimulus Type, and Group there were natural pauses because it
was divided into five subtests. Further-
LI groupb Control groupc
more, during the testing, the speech–
Same pair Different pair Same pair Different pair language pathologist for each child
with LI was always present. The
Memory loada M SD M SD M SD M SD
speech–language pathologists knew
2 81 22 79 20 85 18 87 22 the children well and monitored them
for signs of fatigue and suggested
3 86 17 76 18 82 18 86 21
breaks when indicated. In the working
4 82 18 39 19 62 18 56 24 memory test, we found strong indica-
5 86 19 19 20 54 20 37 32 tions that fatigue or attention problems
did not play a role in the participants’
Note. LI = language impairment. Values represent the mean percentage of correct responses relative to the performance, because the false alarm
total number of responses. rate (errors on same pairs) for both
aNumber of syllables in stimulus. bn = 15. cn = 99.
groups was much lower than the true
error rate (errors on different pairs) on
Finally, it should be pointed out that in memory problems in children with LI all memory loads (see Table 1). If at-
spite of the between-group differences have been demonstrated in other stud- tention problems or executive problems
in speech discrimination, the overall ies (Gathercole & Baddeley, 1990). caused the lower performance of the LI
performance was high for both groups, Moreover, verbal working memory is a group, a higher false alarm rate would
which makes the clinical relevance of good predictor of lexical development have been observed in comparison to
this finding uncertain. (Gathercole, Willis, Baddeley, & Em- the controls.
Working memory was evidently the slie, 1994) and is involved in language We are aware of the drawbacks asso-
most sensitive of the three auditory pa- comprehension and expression (Adams ciated with the relatively small size of
rameters tested in this study. Working & Gathercole, 1995). This suggests that the study group. However, given the

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jld-v35n6-p540 10/29/02 11:11 AM Page 545

VOLUME 35, NUMBER 6, NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2002 545

background information from the

broad investigation program recruit-
ing and selecting children for the
speech schools in Stockholm, we be-
lieve that the investigated LI group is
representative and that our findings
can be generalized. Nevertheless, the
absence of differences between the
study groups in TRAP could be due to
the small group size. However, it
should be noted that Tallal and Piercy
(1973) examined the same number of
children with LI in their original ex-
periment. On the other hand, the find-
ing that we could demonstrate signifi-
cant differences in verbal working
memory and auditory speech discrim-
ination in this small sample indicates
that those alterations are large and
robust.
FIGURE 3. Distribution of scores in percentage of correct responses for each inter-
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
stimulus interval (ISI) in the temporal resolution of auditory perception test for the
Fritjof Norrelgen is a speech–language pathol- language impairment (LI) group and the control group. Boxes represent the 25th to
ogist and postgraduate student at the Neurope- the 75th percentile scores, and error bars represent the 5th to the 95th percentile.
diatric Unit, Department of Women and Child The symbol in each box represents the median.
Health, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm. His re-
search project concerns working memory and
auditory perception in neurodevelopmental dis- TABLE 2
orders. Francisco Lacerda, PhD, is an associ- Correct Responses on the Temporal Resolution of Auditory Perception Test by
ate professor of linguistics in the Department of Interstimulus Interval, Stimulus Type, and Group
Linguistics, Stockholm University. His research
interests focus on emergent processes triggered LI groupb Control groupc
by associative learning. Hans Forssberg, MD, Same pair Different pair Same pair Different pair
PhD, is professor in neuropediatrics at the Neu-
ropediatric Unit, Department of Women and ISIa M SD M SD M SD M SD
Child Health, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm.
He is interested in neurodevelopmental disor- 256 88 13 81 20 85 20 79 21
ders. Address: Fritjof Norrelgen, Neuropedi- 128 78 14 67 29 82 19 71 23
atric Unit, Q2:07, Astrid Lindgren Children’s 64 58 22 60 24 62 26 63 23
Hospital, S-171 76 Stockholm, Sweden; e-mail:
32 52 23 45 25 54 25 55 25
fritjof.norrelgen@ks.se
16 48 17 48 25 52 23 51 25

AUTHORS’ NOTES
1. This research was kindly supported by
grants from Sunnerdahl Foundation, the So-
ciety Barnavård, the Foundation Frimurare
Barnhuset, and the Swedish Medical Re-
search Council (Project No. K99-14X-
05925-19D).
2. We would like to thank the following people
for their help with this research: The chil-
dren, teachers, and personnel of Stureby
school, Enskedefältets school, Tallkrogens
school, and the day care centers Rothugget,
Kotten, and Långåkersvägen for their great
helpfulness and patience; the participants
and personnel of the language preschools
Bamse, Biet, Röda korsets Lidingöhem, Tal-
och språkcentrum, and Videgården for their
Note. LI = language impairment. Values represent the mean percentage of correct responses relative to the
total number of responses.
aInterstimulus interval in ms. bn = 15. cn = 99.
enthusiasm and willingness to cooperate in
this project; and psychologist Ingela Bozkurt
for helping us with the cognitive testing.
NOTES
1. Vowels can be described as the result of a
voice source (created by the vocal folds’ vi-
bration) that is filtered by the vocal tract.
Thus, changes in the vocal tract’s configura-
tion resulting from articulatory gestures
lead to different acoustic output that is per-
ceived as different vowels. To produce a typ-
Downloaded from ldx.sagepub.com by Maxim Andreea on October 29, 2014
ical syllable consisting of a stop consonant
followed by a vowel, the speaker essentially
blocks the vocal tract, interrupting the vowel
production. As a consequence of the articu-
latory movements from the stop consonant
into the following vowel, the resonance fre-
quencies of the vocal tract (technically called
formants) change rapidly. These rapid
changes, or formant transitions, convey
information about the specific consonant
that preceded the vowel.
2. Ten of the 25 children with LI could not com-
plete the computerized tests. Six of them
jld-v35n6-p540 10/29/02 11:11 AM Page 546
546
were unable to integrate the concepts of
same and different, which was essential for
managing the training phase and the follow-
ing tests, possibly due to poor cognitive abil-
ity, as they all had IQ scores below 85. Two
participants were not willing to cooperate at
all in the test situation. Both these children
had subclinical autism spectrum problems
according to the records from the speech–
language pathologists. Two participants
failed to complete the tests because of poor
endurance. Both were reported to have at-
tention problems.
3. Only children with Swedish as the mother
tongue were included because the contrasts
used to test speech discrimination and ver-
bal working memory are relevant only to
Swedish. None of the typical children was
reported to have mental retardation, severe
neuropsychiatric problems or emotional
problems, frank neurological disorders, or
hearing impairment. The control group chil-
dren were not screened for specific learning
disabilities.
4. To avoid transients, the signal always
started at a positive zero crossing and ended
with the same phase. The actual duration of
the stimulus was therefore adjusted to in-
clude the integer number of periods neces-
sary to achieve a signal duration as close as
possible to the specified 20 ms.
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