Background and Aim: The purpose of this research is to study the standardization of speaking and reading rates in a group of normal speaker of female students, and to compare them. As the rate of speech is an important variable in the evaluation and treatment of stuttering, cluttering, dysarthria and apraxia.

Materials and Method: One hundred of second grade students of primary school and an equal number of fifth grade students participated in this study. All subjects were native speakers of Farsi, who passed an informal, screening test of articulation and speech. None of the subjects had a history of speech, hearing, or neurological disorders. The subjects were asked to read from the 180 words portion of their Farsi book and tell story. Their speech was recorded by using a tape recorder. Then the data were analyzed for word and syllable rate. In transcribing the samples, single morpheme was counted as single word and compound words were counted as two words if they had two free morphemes. Non-word interjections were excluded from word and syllable counts while word interjections and repeated words were included in the count. Independent t-test and paired t-test were used for analyzing.

Results: In the second grade students the reading rate is, on the average, 189.4 syllable per minute (SPM)(94.9 word per minute(WPM), 3.1 syllable per second(SPS)) and the talking rate is 189.8 SPM (99.1 WPM, 3.1 SPS) and in the fifth grade student the reading rate is 223.9 SPM (119.0 WPM, 3.7SPS) and the talking rate is 210.26 SPM (109.5 WPM , 3.4 SPS).

Conclusion: The result highlight that in the fifth grade students, reading rates are higher than talking rates while in the second grade they are not, because they do not have enough skills for whole word reading. A remarkable finding in this research is that, reading and talking rates in the fifth grade students are higher than the second grade students.

Background and Aim: Analysis of transient evoked otoacoustic emissions(TEOAEs) is of considerable interest due to their close relation with cochlear mechanisms which reveal cochlear function.The particular structure of TEOAEs requires a method with both a satisfactory time and frequency resolution. Among different methods the time –frequency techniques are the most suitable approaches. The aim of this study was to investigate the differences between neonate’s cochlear function and adult’s cochlear function using time –frequency approaches in TEOAEs.

Materials and Method: The data of this cohort study was obtained from a sample of 23 normal neonates, aged between 1-28 days, and 31 normal adults, aged between 18 -25 years.TEOAEs with click stimulus were performed for both ears .The TEOAEs files were investigated in time – frequency transform software in off-line mode. The signal to noise ratio(SNR) and response level (dB) of TEOAEs were analysed.

Results: The reproducibility, SNR and response level in neonates was greater than adults and in both groups there were no significant difference between responses of males and females and of the right and the left ears.

Concolusion: There are differences between neonate’s and adult’s cochlear response. High frequencies responses are stronger in neonate’s cochlea.

Background and Aim: The short-term memory (STM) has been studied to a great extent so far. Using some strategies and techniques to help the subject to access to his/her memory is important for Speech pathologist. Priming is a process that increases the chance of accessing to some information of memory by means of some simulations. So, primings are some words which facilitate the retrieval of the target words. The purpose of this study is comparing phonological and semantic priming on the short verbal memory span.
Materials and Methods: The research was conducted on sixty-four 18-25 year-old male students in Tehran University of Medical sciences. Due to some distortion factors, including bilingualism, stutter-ing, and articulation problem, that can effect the reaction time, were determined as exclusion critenia. In additiion, subjects with difficulty in Wepman auditory discrimination were ruled out. The test was performed via the second version of programmed DMDX software and reaction time was recorded.
Results: Semantic tasks and rhyming tasks were retrieved faster than the other tasks in lexical access respectively. There was a significant difference between the semantic and rime tasks but there is no significant difference between alliteration and unrelated tasks.
Conclusion: The result of this research indicates that the semantic level is activated faster than the other levels and the phonological level is activated right after that. The alliteration level is the last level that activated. It has some similarities with some other investigations on the reaction time in phono-logical tasks

Background and Aim: Matching a mother wavelet to class of signals can be of interest in signal analysis and denoising based on wavelet multiresolution analysis and decomposition. As transient evoked otoacoustic emissions (TEOAES) are contaminated with noise, the aim of this work was to provide a quantitative approach to the problem of matching a mother wavelet to TEOAE signals by using tuning curves and to use it for analysis and denoising TEOAE signals. Approximated mother wavelet for TEOAE signals was calculated using an algorithm for designing wavelet to match a specified signal.
Materials and Methods: In this paper a tuning curve has used as a template for designing a mother wavelet that has maximum matching to the tuning curve. The mother wavelet matching was performed on tuning curves spectrum magnitude and phase independent of one another. The scaling function was calculated from the matched mother wavelet and by using these functions, lowpass and highpass filters were designed for a filter bank and otoacoustic emissions signal analysis and synthesis. After signal analyzing, denoising was performed by time windowing the signal time-frequency component.
Results: Aanalysis indicated more signal reconstruction improvement in comparison with coiflets mother wavelet and by using the purposed denoising algorithm it is possible to enhance signal to noise ratio up to dB.
Conclusion: The wavelet generated from this algorithm was remarkably similar to the biorthogonal wavelets. Therefore, by matching a biorthogonal wavelet to the tuning curve and using wavelet packet analysis, a high resolution time-frequency analysis for the otoacoustic emission signals is possible.

Background and Aim: Due to its ability in bonding with hard and soft tissue, healing and repairing of the bone, and proper replacing of the ossicles in middle ear, bioactive glass has come into consideration. The aim of this work was preparation, development and characterization of nanopowder bioactive glass obtained by the sol-gel technique.
Materials and Methods: Bioglass powder was made by sol-gel technique and the presence of desired elements is tested by X-ray fluorescence analysis. Trans Electronic Microscopic (TEM) technique was used to evaluate the powders shape and size. The prepared bioglass powder was immersed in the simulated body fluid solution for 30 days. Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy was utilized to recognize and to confirm the formation of apatite layer on prepared bioglass powder. (XRD) as a structural characterization technique was used to investigate the microstructure.
Results: The glass powder size was less than 100 nanometers. The formation of apatite layer confirmed the bioactivity of the bioglass powder and tests revealed that all the films had the signs of bioactivity. It was also found that at sintering temperatures above 900 ºC, crystalline phase Ca₂SiO₄ was formed.
Conclusion: The sol-gel nanopowder bioglass can be used as a replacement for small bones such as ossicles in middle ear, and it leads to bone osteointegration and growth of the surrounding tissue.

Background and Aim: Internal Evaluation means assessment of abilities and potentials. To promote the quality of education, research, health and finally rehabilitation is one of the most important roles and responsibilities of the universities. Promotion of quality of the theoretical and practical education for the Audiology students provides this major with its final goal that is to serve society. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the strength, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOTs) of the Audiology department and to identify the ways of diminishing weaknesses and threats.
Materials and Methods: This descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted on undergraduates, postgraduates, graduates, academic staff, and the director of Audiology department in 9 areas, including management flowchart, educational programs, instructional methods and curriculum models, students, educational areas and equipments, graduate, academic staff, research, and treatment. Data were collected by questionnaires. Results were analyzed descriptively and were expressed in raw and percentage.
Results: The scores of areas in two measures were as follows: management flowchart 4.36 (87.31%), educational programs 4.17 (83.58%), instructional methods and curriculum models 4.01 (80.26%), students 3.43 (68.60%), educational areas and equipment 3.60 (72.11%), from the view of undergraduates, post graduates, faculties, graduates 3.60 (72.03%), academic staff 4.03 (80.6%), research 3.52 (70.4%), and treatment 4.54 (90.80%). The highest score was, therefore, of the treatment area and the lowest belonged to the educational area and equipments. The score of the Audiology department, as the main factor was 3.89 out of 5 which was 77.88%.
Conclusion: Audiology group total score indicates the desirable status that can be promoted to the most desirable if SWOTs are considered.

Background and Aim: Middle latency auditory evoked potentials (MLAEPs) development takes longer time than the auditory brainstem response (ABR) development does, which makes them difficult to record in some children. The purpose of this study was to investigate the age effect on characteristics and detection of MLAEPs in children and adults.
Materials and Methods: This cross sectional study was conducted on 15 children aged   7-12 yr and 31 adults aged 20-50 yr with normal peripheral hearing. To investigate precisely, children were divided in two subgroups of older and younger than 10 years old, as well. The MLAEPs amplitudes and latencies were recorded by conventional protocol and compared.
Results: Adult Na mean latency, 20.86 ms, was less than that of children, 22.86 ms, (p=0.0025).  In contrast, the adult Nb mean latency, 44.93 ms, was longer (p=0.0001). Children Nb mean latency was 42.02 ms. There was no significant difference in MLAEP amplitudes and latencies between two children subgroups, although variance was more in younger children.
Conclusion: MLAEPs are reliably recorded after 7 years old. Characteristics of MLAEPs are different in adults and children so that the primary MLAEPs generators have a course of development extending beyond the first decade of life. As those potentials were recorded in all children, it is suggested to be used in their test batteries for hearing evaluation.

Background and Aim: Vestibular evoked myogenic potential (VEMPs) is one of the clinical tools to evaluate vestibular function. The VEMPs can be recorded from sternocleidomastoid muscle by auditory stimulation with various sound stimuli and are thought to have saccular origin. The aim of this study was to compare the VEMP responses evoked by short (500 Hz) tone burst (STB) with those evoked by click stimuli in healthy young individuals.          

Materials and Methods: Thirty healthy volunteers (15 males, 15 females) with ages of 18 to 30 years were enrolled in this study. Subjects were instructed to sit on a chair and rotate their head to the opposite side of the recording muscle. The VEMPs was recorded using 500 Hz STB and then click sound stimuli to each ear. The p13 and n23 latencies, p13-n23 peak-to-peak amplitude and VEMPs thresholds were obtained for further analysis.       

Results: The VEMP responses were present in all subjects for STB and ware not recorded in one subject for click. The latencies of p13 and n23 of STB-VEMP were significantly longer, and the p13- n23 amplitudes were significantly greater for STB-VEMP (p<0.05), and thresholds were higher for clicks (p < 0.05). No significant difference was obtained between both ears and genders. (p > 0.05).

Conclusion: The VEMP responses were significantly different between the stimuli of STB and click, and the norms of different stimuli should be established for clinical interpretations. According to these data, we recommend STB stimuli in comparison with clicks for clinical diagnosis.

Background and Aim: Assessment of central auditory processing skills needs various behavioral tests in format of a test battery. There is a few Persian speech tests for documenting central auditory processing disorders. The purpose of this study was developing a dichotic test formed of one-syllabic words suitable for evaluation of central auditory processing in Persian language children and reporting its preliminary results in a group of normal children.
Materials and Methods: Persian words in competing manner test was developed utilizing most frequent monosyllabic words in children storybooks reported in the previous researches. The test was performed at MCL on forty-five normal children (39 right-handed and 6 left-handed) aged 5-11 years. The children did not show any obvious problem in hearing, speech, language and learning. Free (n=28) and directed listening (n=17) tasks were investigated.
Results: The results show that in directed listening task, there is significant advantage for performance of pre-cued ear relative to opposite side. Right ear advantage is evident in free recall condition. Average performance of the children in directed recall is significantly better than free recall. Average row score of the test increases with the children age.
Conclusion: Persian words in competing manner test as a dichotic test, can show major characteristics of dichotic listening and effect of maturation of central auditory system on it in normal children.

Background and Aim: The primary energy for speech production is prepared by breathing flow. As there was no index for the maximum phonation time(MPT) to compare normal and speech disordered speakers in Iran, the purpose of this study was to establish this standard for guidance school students in Tehran. 
Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional study was performed on 576 guidance students from 1^st, 5^th, 8^th, 10^th, 15^th and 19^th educational regions. Each student made an usual inhalation and produced the /a/ for three times with the maximum strength but in a way that he/she didn&apost feel tension on his/her neck or larynx. The maximum time was recorded as the maximum phonation time.
Results: The results of this research revealed that girls`s MPT in all regions was 15.3, 16.7, and 17.16 seconds and the boys` was 15.41, 16.7 and 17.01 seconds and all students` 15.36, 16.17 and 17.08 seconds in order of their grades. There was significant difference between first and third grade mean MPT (p=0.003).
Conclusion: The result of this study indicates that, as the students age increases their MPT increase, too. Also, boys` MPT was more than girls` in first and second grades however, in third grade the girls` MPT was more.

Background and Aim:  Among all auditory assessment tools, auditory steady state response (ASSR) is a modern test. Modulation frequency for this test is usually 80 Hz. The purpose of this study, was to examined adult subjects with 40 Hz and 80 Hz ASSR and compare the results.
Materials and Methods: Thirty adult (60 ears) were evaluated by ASSR and PTA test, Results were divided into three groups: normal hearing, mild and moderate sensorineural hearing loss.
Results: In all groups, forty hertz ASSR thresholds were relatively closer to behavioral threshold than those of 80 Hz ASSR(p<0.05). Besides, the more severe hearing loss, the lower the difference between those two thresholds. Correlation coefficients were also higher in 40 Hz ASSR(p<0.05).
Conclusion: Frequency modulation thresholds with 40 Hz are more likely to be closer to the behavioral thresholds. Moreover, it has better results than the thresholds with 80 Hz.

Background and Aim: Patients with Parkinson&aposs disease manifest oculomotor abnormalities. This is the consequence of basal ganglia impairment.  The most common abnormalities include increased saccade latency, hypometric saccades  and decreased saccade velocity. The purpose of this study was comparison of saccadic parameters using videonystagmography in patients with idiopathic Parkinson&aposs disease and normal subjects.
Materials and Methods: In this cross sectional study, saccadic movements were investigated in thirty patients with idiopathic Parkinson&aposs disease and thirty age matched subjects were 35-70 years old. Saccade latency, velocity and accuracy were quantitatively analyzed.
Results: Results of this study indicated increased saccade latency, reduction of saccade velocity and accuracy in patients with Parkinson&aposs disease(P<0.001).
Conclusion: This study showed that patients with Parkinson&aposs disease manifest saccadic deficits. This suggests dopaminergic control of these ocular movements.

Background and Aim: Regions in the cochlea with no (or very few) functioning inner hair cells and/or neurons are called dead regions. The aim of this study was to identify the cochlear dead regions in moderate to profound sensory neural hearing impaired children through the Threshold equalizing noise (TEN_HL) test.
Materials and Methods: In this cross-sectional study, the TEN(HL) was performed for the all frequencies available on test CD, on 30 children with ages ranging from five to forteen years (mean age, 8.5 ±2.8 years old).
Results: In this study, 58.3% of ears were found to have a dead region for at least one frequency. Classifying by test frequencies, 20% were found to have a dead region, 24% to be inconclusive and 56% to have no dead regions. The difference between mean SNR(T) in ears with and without dead regions was statistically significant. The difference between mean absolute thresholds in two groups was statistically significant at 1000 Hz and below (p <0.05).
Conclusion: The results indicated a relatively high prevalence of dead regions in children with sensory neural hearing impairment, especially for frequencies at which the hearing loss exceeds 70 dB HL.

Background and Aim: Tinnitus is the consciousness of sound that arises in the ear or head without any external sound origin. The efficacies of transmeatal low-level laser irradiation for tinnitus treatment were reported before. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of low level laser therapy on tinnitus and ECochG and DPOAEs parameters.
Materials and Methods: The study design was prospective, quasi experimental. This investigation conducted on 16 ears (10 patients) with disabling tinnitus. All patients underwent ENT examination, complete audiological evaluation, tinnitus study, ECochG and DPOAEs, and finally completing tinnitus data sheet. The results were compared before and after irradiation.
Results: Means of tinnitus loudness (LMT) and CAP amplitudes were significant different before and after irradiation (p<0.005). There was no any other significant difference before and after low level laser irradiation in subjective loudness, pitch matching annoyance grade of tinnitus and DPOAEs and other ECochG parameters.
Conclusion: Transmeatal low-power laser irradiation with 200 mW seems not to be effective for treatment of tinnitus. This paper is the research brief report. In clinical point of view, this study should be repeated with a greater sample size although our results were statistically important.

Background and aim: Reading is one of the most essential skills in this century. Reading disorders can cause several problems for the person who has reading disorder. Early assessment and diagnosis play an important role in treatment of this disorder. The main purpose of this study was to develope a screening inventory reading test (IRT) for first to fifth grade student in Isfahan in order to early diagnosis of reading disorder.
Materials and Methods: The test, consisting of 100 words context and four comprehension questions, named Inventory Reading Test (IRT), was evaluated by several speech therapists. It was standardized by testing on one thousand boys and girls, 200 students in every grade, that were selected through a multi-stage random sampling method. Test was performed on two other groups, a normal and a reading-disordered.
Results: Scores of reading accuracy and velocity were highly correlated with the test total score. Test reliability was calculated as 0.77 by Cronbach`s alpha measure. There was significant difference between two groups mean score (p=0.01).
Conclusion: IRT seems to be an appropriate tool for screening reading disorder of first to fifth grade students.

Background and Aim: Nowadays, auditory perception is not a complete method to assess vowels quality and we need to use more objective instruments.In this study we want to determine and compare the persian vowels formants in normal and hearing Impaired students in 7ـ9 year old children of Isfahan.
Materials and Methods: This cross sectional study was performed on 64 normal and hearing impaired students. Background information was by interview and then, vowel production test was performed. First three formants of each vowel were obtained and recorded by speech studio soft ware and Dr. Speech device Data were compared between groups.
Results: Mean F₁ and F₂, and F₂/F₁ and F₃/F₁ ratio of Persian vowels between these three studied groups were different significantly. Mean F₃ of /o/, /e/ and /a/ in all groups was different significantly. Although we could not find such a significant differences for /u/, /i/ and /æ/ between these groups(p<0.05).
Conclusion: The most important difference between normal and hearing impaired children is their vowel Space, and we found that, the more sever the hearing impairment is, the closer vowel space will be seen. The hearing impaired children rely mostly on their proprioceptive sense because of their hearing deficiency and it causes less movement of the tongue, so they usually substitute vowels which have similar F₁ and F₂.

Background and Aim: For better using of electropalatography in assessment and treatment procedures it is important to know normal tongue to palate contact patterns. Several factors can change consonant&aposs articulatory patterns. One of them is voicing. In addition to determine amount of spacial indices of studied consonants, this research aimed to study tongue behavior related to change in voicing.
Materials and Methods: This is a descriptive analytic study. Consonant linguapalatal contacts were studied using reading electropalatography by recording 4 normal Persian speaking adults (aged between 21-25) repeating CVCV syllables (C=/s,z,t,d/, V=/a/) ten times. Contact patterns were examined for total number of electrodes contacted and other spatial indices. Comparisons were made across voicing contrast.
Results: In this study amount of spacial indices of studied consonants determined. It&aposs found that there was not significant difference between voiced and voiceless cognate according to number of contact and other special indices.
Conclusion: The findings of this study are in according with previous studies in other languages about the effect of voicing upon linguapalatal contact patterns. Difference in voicing does not make clear change in spacial indices related to tongue contact pattern. Compared to other parts, Tip of the tongue seem to be more sensitive for change in voicing and oral air pressure.

Background and Aim: One of the most common complaints, particularly among patients with normal or near normal low-frequency hearing, is that their voice sounds "hollow". This is associated with "Occlusion effect". The aim of this study was to comparison of occlusion effect in normal hearing subjects via Real Ear Measurement and Audiometric Bing test.
Materials and Method: Twenty volunteers with normal hearing (10 male, 10 female), with ages ranging from 18 - 24 years were enrolled in this study. First, audiometric Bing test was performed in frequencies of 250, 500, 750 and 1000 Hz. Then in real ear measurement, subjects were instructed to vocalize /â/ and /i/ for 5 seconds. Probe microphone was recorded the sound pressure in the ear canals. The degrees of occlusion effect unit were obtained for further analysis.
Results: The means of occlusion effect were present in all subjects. There was no correlation between the results of audiometric Bing test and real-ear measurement. No significant difference was obtained between genders and monaural or binaural occlusion in real-ear measurement. But in audiometric Bing test, the difference between monaural or binaural occlusion was significant(p<0.05).
Conclusion: The peak of occlusion effect varies significantly among hearing aid users, so the hearing aid must be tuned. Probe- microphone measures will assist in determination how much gain is enough, and where frequency- specific adjustments are needed.

Background and Aim: Tinnitus is an unpleasant sound which can cause some behavioral disorders. According to evidence the origin of tinnitus is not only in peripheral but also in central auditory system. So evaluation of central auditory system function is necessary. In this study Auditory brainstem responses (ABR) were compared in noise induced tinnitus and non-tinnitus control subjects.
Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional, descriptive and analytic study is conducted in 60 cases in two groups including of 30 noise induced tinnitus and 30 non-tinnitus control subjects. ABRs were recorded ipsilateraly and contralateraly and their latencies and amplitudes were analyzed.
Results: Mean interpeak latencies of III-V (p= 0.022), I-V (p=0.033) in ipsilatral electrode array and mean absolute latencies of IV (p=0.015) and V (p=0.048) in contralatral electrode array were significantly increased in noise induced tinnitus group relative to control group.
Conclusion: It can be concluded from that there are some decrease in neural transmission time in brainstem and there are some sign of involvement of medial nuclei in olivery complex in addition to lateral lemniscus.

Background and Aim: In neural response telemetry (NRT), intracochlear electrodes stimulate the auditory nerve and record the neural responses. The electrical stimulation send to the auditory nerve by an electrode and the resulted response, called electrically evoked compound action potential (ECAP), is recorded by an adjacent electrode. The most important clinical applications of this test are evaluation and monitoring the intra and postoperative responses of auditory nerve and help to primary setting of speech processor. The aim of this study was evaluating of the potential&aposs threshold changes in three monthes after receiving the devise in pediatric cochlear implant recipients.
Materials and Methods: This longitudinal study evaluated the potential&aposs threshold in four given electrodes in four sessions after receiving the device by approximately one months intervals in children implanted in Amir Alam and Hazrat-e-Rasoul hospitals in 2007, July to December.
Results: ECAP mean threshold level of each electrode did not significantly change in differnent sessions, while there was significant difference between apical and basal electrodes&apos responses in every session(p<0.001).
Conclusion: The reliabiliy of the responses result in more certainty of clinician to fit the speech processor for a long time. Better responses in apical electrodes may lead to develope an effective coding strategy.