Habilidades de discriminação auditiva em crianças com desvios fonológicos evolutivos**** Hearing discrimination abilities in children with phonological disorders

Background: hearing discrimination abilities in children with phonological disorders. Aim: to investigate the ability of hearing discrimination in children with Phonological Disorders who received or were receiving phonological treatment; to verify if the altered phonemes were the same as those which were not discriminated in the Picture Test for Hearing Discrimination (adapted for Portuguese language by Mota et al 2000, based on "The Boston University Speech Sound Discrimination Picture Test") and to verify if the ability of hearing discrimination is related to gender, age and the phonological disorder severity level. Method: 41 children, 16 females and 25 males, with ages ranging between 4 and 8.2 years were evaluated. Data used for analyses were taken from the results obtained in the Picture Test for Hearing Discrimination and from the Phonological Assessment. Results: no statistically significant difference between genders Statistical analyses also indicated that the performance in the Picture Test for Hearing Discrimination was correlated to age. The more severe the phonological disorder the higher the number of phonemes that were not discriminated. Conclusions: hearing discrimination inability can be a causative or aggravating factor of phonological disorder, although this rule does not apply to all cases.