A comparative study of psycholinguistic and central deafness tests for identification of children with auditory perceptual deficiencies

The purpose of this study was to investigate the performance of young elementary children with differing auditory language abilities on tests of central auditory functioning (central deafness). Language abilities were based on the Illinois Test of Psycholinguistic Abilities (ITPA) and Slosson Oral Reading Test (SORT) level vs. Reading Expectancy level performances. Group A, the control group, scored in the normal range on both the ITPA and the SORT. Groups B and C were both deficient in reading skills by at least one year. The difference between these groups was their ITPA performance. Group C displayed average ITPA profiles while Group B scored significantly lower in auditory skills.Four central deafness tests designed by Willeford and the Sound Mimicry Test of the Goldman-Fristoe-Woodcock Auditory Skills Test Battery were administered to all subjects. A One Way Analysis of Variance was used to analyze differences in performance between groups on all test variables.Pearson Correlation Coefficients were used to study relationships between the ITPA and the central deafness tests and the Sound Mimicry Test. Group B, subjects with poor ITPAauditory subtest scores, also scored significantly lower on two of the central deafness tests. Group C scored significantly lower than the control group only on the Sound Mimicry Test.Great disparity among individual scores within groups detracts from possible conclusions to be drawn from this study. It appears, however, that the two central deafness tests designed to assess brainstem integrity (Binaural Fusion and Alternating Speech) correlate with performances on the ITPA auditory subtests. Scores on the ITPA Auditory Memory subtest appear to correlate with the Sound Mimicry Test suggesting that these subjects experience difficulty with temporal order sequencing tasks. A larger testing population would be necessary to substantiate trends noted in this research.Thesis (M.A.