Efficacy of Speech Therapy with Educable Mentally Retarded

A TWO -PHASE PROJECT CONCERNED WITH THE EFFECTIVENESS OF SPEECH THERAPY WITH EDUCABLE MENTALLY RETARDED (EMR) CHILDREN IN A PUBLIC SCHOOL SETTING HAD TWO OBJECTIVES -TO ASSEMBLE A REASONABLY COMPLETE PICTURE OF ARTICULATION OF EDUCABLE MENTALLY RETARDED CHILDREN AND TO DETERMINE. THE VALUE OF SPEECH THERAPY TO EMR CHILDREN WITH ARTICULATION DEFICIENCIES. THE HEJNA ARTICULATION TESTS AND A SPEECH INTELLIGIBILITY RATING OF 777 CHILDREN (AGES 6-16, IQ RANGE 48 -78) WERE ANALYZED, AND THE 415 SPEECH HANDICAPPED WERE DIVIDED INTO THREE GROUPS--(1) EXPERIMENTAL, GIVEN SPEECH THERAPY TWICE WEEKLY, (2) CONTROL, GIVEN NO THERAPY, (3) PLACEBO, GIVEN GENERAL LANGUAGE STIMULATION, WITH NO SPECIFIC WORK ON ARTICULATION SOUNDS. EVALUATION OF PROGRESS WAS BASED ON ARTICULATION TESTS GIVEN AT SIX -MONTH INTERVALS OVER A THREE -YEAR PERIOD. STUDY OF SUBJECTS BEFORE THERAPY SHOWED SEVERITY OF ARTICULATION ERRORS WAS NOT SIGNIFICANT TO IQ AT THE .01 LEVEL, BUT CHRONOLOGICAL AGE (CA) AND MENTAL AGE (MA) HAS A SIGNIFICANT RELATIONSHIP TO SEVERITY. MEDIAN TESTS REVEALED THAT DIFFERENCES SIGNIFICANT AT THE .01 LEVEL EXISTED BETWEEN THE SPEECH HANDICAPPED AND THE NON SPEECH HANDICAPPED IN REGARD TO IQ, MA, AND CA. THE HYPOTHESIS THAT THE DEVELOPMENT OF SPEECH BY MA LEVELS OF THE RETARDATES COULD CLOSELY ALIGN WITH THE DEVELOPMENT OF SOUNDS BY CA OF NORMAL CHILDREN WAS REJECTED. THE HYPOTHESIS THAT THE SEVERITY OF ARTICULATION HANDICAPS IS A FUNCTION OF MA AND CA WAS ACCEPTED. DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE EXPERIMENTAL GROUP AND THE CONTROL OF PLACEBO GROUP WERE NOT STATISTICALLY SIGNIFICANT. SPEECH THERAPY WAS FOUND TO HAVE NO MORE SIGNIFICANT EFFECT ON SOUND ERROR REDUCTION THAN DID MATURATION. DATA ABOUT THE RELATIONSHIP OF SEX TO ERROR REDUCTION WAS NOT FOUND SIGNIFICANT. TABLES PRESENT STATISTICAL FINDINGS. A 21 -ITEM REFERENCE LIST IS INCLUDED.