Developmental dysarthria is a motor speech disorder characterized by reduces intelligibility and impairments on at least one speech subsystem such as breathing, phonation, resonance, articulation and/or prosody. Due to similar perceptual characteristics with a delayed speech-language development and with other speech disorders, recognizing this disorder can be a challenge for many speech and language therapists. It is most often assessed and diagnosed by a perceptual assessment of speech. To achieve a more accurate detection of deviations in speech, an acoustic analysis of speech could be used in the assessment process, which would add objective confirmation to the perceptual assessment.
The aim of this master's thesis was to study the field of acoustic evaluation of speech in developmental dysarthria. The theoretical part of the master's thesis presents developmental dysarthria and its characteristics, assessment of signs of developmental dysarthria and treatment of children with developmental dysarthria. In what follows, acoustic measurements of speech and acoustic characteristics of dysarthric speech are presented. The aim of this master's thesis was also to design and implement an evaluation protocol for the speech of children with developmental dysarthria and thereby determine which acoustic parameters distinguish the speech of children with dysarthria from the speech of children with typical development. By implementing the protocol we obtained voice recordings, with the help of which we measured the maximum phonation time (MPT), the range of the fundamental frequency, the articulation rate and the range of F1 and F2 within diphthongs in children with developmental dysarthria. Individual parameters were analyzed in the speech analysis software Praat, statistically processed and compared with the results of children from the group with typical speech. MPT, fundamental frequency range and articulation rate proved to be statistically differentiating acoustic parameters. The acoustic profiles of children with developmental dysarthria were diverse.
|