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doi:10.1016/j.bandl.2005.07.026 
Copyright © 2005 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Auditory temporal information processing in preschool children at family risk for dyslexia: Relations with phonological abilities and developing literacy skills
Accepted 9 July 2005.
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Abstract
In this project, the hypothesis of an auditory temporal processing deficit in dyslexia was tested by examining auditory processing in relation to phonological skills in two contrasting groups of five-year-old preschool children, a familial high risk and a familial low risk group. Participants were individually matched for gender, age, non-verbal IQ, school environment, and parental educational level. Psychophysical thresholds were estimated for gap-detection, frequency modulation detection, and tone-in-noise detection using a three-interval forced-choice adaptive staircase paradigm embedded within a computer game. Phonological skills were measured by tasks assessing phonological awareness, rapid serial naming, and verbal short-term memory. Significant group differences were found for phonological awareness and letter knowledge. In contrast, none of the auditory tasks differentiated significantly between both groups. However, both frequency modulation and tone-in-noise detection were significantly related to phonological awareness. This relation with phonological skills was not present for gap-detection.
Keywords: Auditory temporal processing; Reading development; Dyslexia; Prediction; Preschoolers; Phonological awareness; Verbal short-term memory; Rapid automatic naming
Article Outline
- 1. Introduction
- 2. Methods
- 2.1. Participants
- 2.2. Apparatus
- 2.2.1. Phonological tests
- 2.2.1.1. Sound identity tasks
- 2.2.1.2. Rhyme fluency test
- 2.2.1.3. Non-word repetition test
- 2.2.1.4. Digit span forward
- 2.2.1.5. Rapid automatic naming
- 2.2.2. Letter knowledge
- 2.2.2.1. Productive letter knowledge
- 2.2.2.2. Receptive letter knowledge
- 2.2.3. Auditory tests
- 2.2.3.1. Audiometric pure-tone detection
- 2.2.3.2. GAP-detection test
- 2.2.3.3. FM-detection test
- 2.2.3.4. Tone-in-noise detection task
- 2.2.4. Psychophysical procedure
- 2.3. Data collection
- 2.4. Statistical analysis
- 3. Results
- 3.1. Phonological skills and letter knowledge
- 3.2. Auditory measures
- 3.3. Relations between phonological and auditory skills
- 3.4. Individual deviance analysis
- 4. Discussion
- 4.1. Feasibility of psychophysical testing in preschoolers
- 4.2. Phonological abilities and letter knowledge
- 4.3. Auditory processing skills
- 4.4. Relations between auditory and phonological abilities
- 5. Conclusion
- Acknowledgements
- References
p < .05.