Background: 'Speech sound disorder' is an umbrella term that encompasses dysarthria, articulation disorders, childhood apraxia of speech and phonological disorders. However, differential diagnosis between these disorders is a persistent challenge in speech pathology, as many diagnostic procedures use symptom clusters instead of identifying an…

Background: Mental health conditions are common among individuals with intellectual disability. Under recognition of mental health disorders leading to unmet treatment needs is common in this population. This article addresses one major contributing factor, the lack of cognitively accessible self-report measures for individuals with intellectual…

The fact that researchers have not been able to reach consensus about what constitutes dyslexia, may lead to inconsistency in the operational definitions of the measures used to assess dyslexia, which in turn jeopardizes the validity of these assessments. As this has potential negative consequences for children in need of remedial reading…

Clinical Question: Would a bilingual preschooler with suspected speech sound disorder (P) be more accurately diagnosed via an assessment approach that integrates sociolinguistic information (I) or via standardized assessment with traditional scoring modifications (C) as shown by diagnostic compatibility with the converging concern approach (O)?…

Background: In 2016/17, the CATALISE Consortium published the results of a multinational and multidisciplinary Delphi consensus study, representing agreement among professionals about the definition and process of identification of children with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) (Bishop et al., 2016, 2017). The extent to which the current…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to compare child language assessment practices of speech-language pathologists (SLPs) working in school and non-school settings to determine if their place of employment impacts the diagnostic decision-making process. Method: School-based SLPs (e.g., direct service providers employed in preschool and/or K-12…

Purpose: The goal of this study was to establish the perceptual underpinnings of the terms that are commonly used by patients when describing the quality of their tinnitus. Method: Using a free-classification method, 15 subjects with normal hearing placed 60 different tinnitus-like sounds into similarity clusters on a grid. Multidimensional…

Evaluations of early screening tests for autism commonly rely on receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis and comparisons of area under the curve (AUC). Whether AUC differs significantly from chance or between test items is not always assessed. Two recent and independent evaluations of the Brief Autism Detection in Early Childhood (BADEC)…

Purpose: Syntax assessment and treatment is a major focus of speech-language pathologists who work with young children with language needs. The Index of Productive Syntax (IPSyn) provides an efficient method for the assessment of syntax of preschool-age children. The purpose of this tutorial is to illustrate how to hand-score an IPSyn from…

Early identification of ASD allows for clinical intervention through mental and behavioral health supports, potentially providing individualized services in the educational setting. This article highlights the research-to-practice gap that exists within evaluations for ASD in schools. Lack of training, variability in assessment guidelines,…

It is well-recognized that measurement options for diagnosing and monitoring children with neurogenetic syndromes (NGS) associated with moderate to severe intellectual impairment are limited (Berry-Kravis, Dev Med Child Neurol 10.1111/dmcn.13018, 2016), and caregivers experience significant concerns regarding the assessment process. However to…

In 2023, immigrants and their United States born offspring accounted for approximately 90.8 million individuals (27%) of the civilian noninstitutionalized U.S. population (Batalova, 2024). Compared to 2010, this is a rise of about 14.7 million (20%). As the global population becomes more diverse, speech-language pathologists (SLPs) face the…

Students with specific learning disabilities (SLD) represent roughly five percent of U.S. public school students aged 3-21. Current federal policy outlines guidelines for identification of SLDs, while ultimately leaving specific procedures to the determination of state and local education agencies. Research into how the method used in…

Background: Published best-practice guidelines and standardized protocols for voice assessment recommend multidisciplinary evaluation utilizing a comprehensive range of clinical measures. Previous studies report variations in assessment practices when compared with these guidelines. Aims: To provide an up-to-date evaluation of current global…

Background: Ultrasound (US) is not widely used as part of the speech and language therapy (SLT) clinical toolkit. The COVID-19 pandemic has intensified interest in US as an alternative to SLT instrumental tools such as the videofluoroscopic swallowing study (VFSS), fibreoptic endoscopic evaluation of swallowing (FEES) and endoscopic evaluation of…