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Objective: To determine phonological processing in elemantery children with Down syndrome

Materials and Methods: Phonetic test is used to extract phonological processing in 40 child with Down syndrome .They were normal in hearing and oral structure.
Results: There was significant difference between girls and boys in some subgroups of phonological processing. In assimilation, voiceless assimilation in boys and complete assimilation in girls were the most. Nasal assimilation in girls and fricative assimilation in boys were the least. In substitution, the least mean belonged to liquid and nasal substitution in girls and voice ness substitution in boys. In general there was no significant difference between age and phonological awareness however, there was direct correlation between syllable structure and age and reverse correlation between age and stop assimilation.
Conclusion: In addition to 3 groups of phonological processing including: syllable structure, assimilation, and substitution, omission was seen. The difference between girls and boys indicates they are impressed by the phonetic structure of words in different ways. Correlation between age and phonological processing shows phonological errors may be resulted from deviation.

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Background and Aim: The ability of conversational repair is a subset of pragmatic language. When the listener does not understand the speaker&aposs intention, and the speaker cannot find a way of repairing the conversation to make his/her massage clear, communication will fail. This study aims to examine and compare the conversational repair skill in two groups of three and five year old children, to determine different conversational repair strategies and compare these skills among these groups.
Methods: One hundred and twenty Persian speaking children of three and five years of Ahwaz, Iran, were selected. The study tools were two series of pictures. During the retelling of the pictures the examiner created a situation to elicit a conversational repair strategy. Percentages of the usage of different kinds of conversational repair in each group were calculated and compared using student&aposs t-test.
Results: The usage of repetition and inappropriate response is decreased in the group of five year olds compared to the three year olds, but cue-repair and repetition method is increased. The addition method has remained relatively constant. There was a significant difference between average percentage of using repetition (p=0.04) and cue-repair (p=0.001) of the two groups. The percentage of application of repetition method in three year olds and cue-term method in five year olds were significantly higher than other conversational repair strategies.
Conclusion: With the increase in age and development of language skills the probability of using more complex and difficult strategies, like the cue-repair method, increases.

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Background and Aim: Staggered spondaic words (SSW) test examines central auditory nervous system . Some researches show stuttering causes hyperactivity in motor system of the right hemisphere and cerebellum and decreases activity in the left hemisphere. During stuttering also, central auditory processing is decreased . The aim of this study was to compare the Persian staggered spondaic word test results between persistent developmental stutterers and normal subjects.

Methods: Thirty people with persistent developmental stuttering were participants of this cross-sectional descriptive-analytic study, which were aged 11 to 40 years. The control group matched for gender and number with stutters. They were 8 females and 22 males, with the age of 11 to 40 years, without any stuttering history, neurological diseases and auditory disorders.

Results: Stutterers were in normal category in corrected staggered spondaic words test. The mean scores of errors of right compete, right ear, left compete, left ear and total in corrected s taggered spondaic words between control and stuttering group showed significant differences. There was a significant relationship between stuttering and effect, too (p<0.05).

Conclusion: Based on the obtained results of this study, stutterers may have different cortical and sub - cortical brain activity than people who have not stutter . Central auditory processing abilities of stutterers are weaker than normal people.

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Background and Aim: Auditory-perceptual assessment of voice a main approach in the diagnosis and therapy improvement of voice disorders. Despite, there are few Iranian studies about auditory-perceptual assessment of voice. The aim of present study was development and determination of validity and rater reliability of Persian version of the Consensus Auditory Perceptual Evaluation of Voice (CAPE -V).

Methods: The qualitative content validity was detected by collecting 10 questionnaires from 9 experienced speech and language pathologists and a linguist. For reliability purposes, the voice samples of 40 dysphonic (neurogenic, functional with and without laryngeal lesions) adults (20-45 years of age) and 10 normal healthy speakers were recorded. The samples included sustain of vowels and reading the 6 sentences of Persian version of the consensus auditory perceptual evaluation of voice called the ATSHA.

Results: The qualitative content validity was proved for developed Persian version of the consensus auditory perceptual evaluation of voice. Cronbach’s alpha was high (0.95). Intra-rater reliability coefficients ranged from 0.86 for overall severity to 0.42 for pitch inter-rater reliability ranged from 0.85 for overall severity to 0.32 for pitch (p<0.05).

Conclusion: The ATSHA can be used as a valid and reliable Persian scale for auditory perceptual assessment of voice in adults.