Non-Linguistic Auditory Processing and Working Memory Update in Pre-School Children Who Stutter: An Electrophysiological Study

Abstract

Non-linguistic auditory processing and working memory update were examined with event-related potentials (ERPs) in 18 children who stutter (CWS) and 18 children who do not stutter (CWNS). Children heard frequent 1kHz tones interspersed with rare 2kHz tones. The two groups did not differ on any measure of the P1 and N1 components, strongly suggesting that early auditory processing of pure tones is unimpaired in CWS. However, as a group, only CWNS exhibited a P3 component to rare tones suggesting that developmental stuttering may be associated with a less efficient attentional allocation and working memory update in response to auditory change.

Atypical central auditory speech-sound discrimination in children who stutter as indexed by the mismatch negativity

“…To the best of our knowledge, only a few studies have examined the neural correlates of stuttering in children (Beal et al, 2011;Beal, 2010;Chang et al, 2008;Kaganovich et al, 2010;Sato et al, 2011;Weber-Fox, Spruill, Spencer, & Smith, 2008;Weber-Fox, Hampton Wray, & Arnold, 2013). Neuroanatomical studies conducted by Chang et al (2008) and Beal (2010) showed reduced gray matter volume in children who stutter (CWS) in the left inferior frontal gyrus, and in temporal regions, compared to typically developing children with fluent speech.…”

Aplicabilidade do Mismatch Negativity na população infantil: revisão sistemática de literatura

“…The participants' ages ranged from 2 months (23) to 12 years of age (4,12,19,22,35,37) . Regarding the parameters used to perform the MMN, most of the research used the speech stimulus (4,(20)(21)(22)(23)(24)(25)(26)30,(32)(33)(34)(35)(36) and other studies opted to perform the MMN with tone burst stimulus (12,19,22,(27)(28)(29)31,(37)(38)(39) . Regarding the tone burst stimulus, it was verified that some studies evaluated with frequency variation (12,(27)(28)(29)31,(37)(38)(39) and 1, by duration and frequency (19) .…”

“…Studies with the use of MMN in children with cleft lip and palate (27,38) and with recurrent otitis media (21) were found, showing the importance of such investigation with the use of an objective method, since otitis media and conductive hearing loss are pathologies that frequently occur in this population, leading to an indicator of risk for changes in auditory processing, language, speech and learning (49) . Studies involving other characteristics such as autistic spectrum disorder (21,34) , ADHD (19) , depression (35) , social isolation (37) , aphasia (39) and stuttering (31) found in this review, evidenced the variety of applications with the use of MMN in children, not only in auditory issues and auditory processing, and this procedure is therefore capable of promoting greater knowledge and diagnostic accuracy in several areas of clinical practice. By evaluating the PEDro scale (18) , it was observed that few articles met the checklist criteria, mainly regarding items of internal validity.…”

“…Only one article (30) evaluated children without auditory complaints and without communication disorders, neurological or genetic alterations. The other articles included in this study investigated MMN responses in specific samples in the child population: children with reading and writing impairment (12) , attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) (19) , language specific disorder (ADL) (4.32) , auditory processing disorders (4.22) , dyslexia, or presenting a risk factor for that (20,(23)(24)(25)(26)28,33), repetitive otitis media(21), autism (29,34) , stuttering (31) , depressed children (35) , premature and low weight children (28,36) , children with cleft lip and / or palate (27,38) , socially isolated children (37) , children with hearing loss (22) , children with aphasia (39) . Considering that a great part of the studies sought to perform evaluation in individuals with peculiar characteristics, 20 of them (4,(19)(20)(21)(22)(23)(24)(25)(26)(27)29,(31)(32)(33)(34)(35)(36)(37)(38)(39) also included, in their method...…”

“…Regarding the place of publication, most articles, totaling 6 (21,28,35,36,38,39) , were developed in Finland. Three articles were written in Brazil (4,12,19) , 3 in the Netherlands (20,23,25) , 3 in the United States (31,32,34) and 3 in France (26,29,30) . Studies have also been found in China (24,27) , Germany (33) , Canada (22) and Israel (37) .…”