Behaviours Identified by South Australian Clinicians as Differentially Diagnostic of Developmental Articulatory Dyspraxia

Abstract

Using a method similar to that of Williams. Packman, Ingham and Rosenthal (1980) this study aimed at identifying those characteristics used by South Australian clinicians in the differential diagnosis of developmental articulatory dyspraxia (DAD) from other childhood articulation disorders. Thirty speech pathologists currently practising in child clinics throughout South Australia participated in a survey, requiring them to classify thirty characteristics as “always”, “sometimes” or “never” associated with functional, dyspraxic and organic childhood articulation disorders. The data were subjected to three different analyses which revealed the strength of association of the characteristics with each disorder. Seven characteristics were found to be significantly associated “always” with DAD, and therefore, potential differentially diagnostic features. These characteristics include: 1) Child demonstrates struggle, groping and trial-and-error behaviours on production of some (or all) phonemes; 2) Child demonstrates inability to volitionally produce an isolated phoneme, or sequence of phonemes, that he/she has correctly produced on other occasions; 3) Child fails to achieve isolated and sequenced oral movements on command, but achieves these at an automatic level; 4) Child's speech development shows a deviant pattern; 5) Child is unable to produce the correct sequence of phonemes on the diadochokinetic task (e.g. ), although able to produce the required phonemes in isolation; 6) Child shows increased number of articulation errors with increased length of utterance; and 7) Inconsistent pattern of articulatory errors is evident in child's speech. Of these seven characteristics, analysis showed that the first three characteristics were more strongly associated with DAD, than the remaining four characteristics.