Date Available

6-6-2011

Year of Publication

2011

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Document Type

Thesis

College

Health Sciences

Department

Communication Disorders

First Advisor

Dr. Robert Marshall

Abstract

Purpose: The Everyday Speech Production Assessment Measure (E-SPAM) is a novel test for assessing changes in clients‟ speech production skills after intervention. This study provides information on reliability and validity for the test and overviews its clinical application.

Method & Procedures: E-SPAM, oral reading, and sequential motion rate tasks were administered to 15 participants with motor speech disorders (MSDs). E-SPAM responses were scored using a 5-point system by four graduate students to assess inter-scorer and temporal reliability and to determine validity for E-SPAM.

Results: Findings of this study indicate that the E-SPAM can be scored with sufficient reliability for clinical use, yields stable scores on repeat administrations, and that its results correlate highly with other accepted measures of speech production ability, specifically sentence intelligibility and severity.

Conclusions: While the results of this study must be considered preliminary because of the small sample size, it does appear that the E-SPAM can provide information about aspects of speech production such as intelligibility, efficiency, and speech naturalness, that are important when treatment focuses on improving speech. The E-SPAM also appears to be a “clinician-friendly” test as it is quick to administer and score and can be administered to patients across the severity continuum.

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