Validation of the Intelligibility in Context Scale for school students in Fiji

Measuring speech intelligibility with deaf and hard-of-hearing children: A systematic review

There is great variability in the ways in which the speech intelligibility of d/Deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) children who use spoken language as part, or all, of their communication system is measured. This systematic review examined the measures and methods that have been used when examining the speech intelligibility of children who are DHH and the characteristics of these measures and methods. A systematic database search was conducted of CENTRAL; CINAHL; Cochrane; ERIC; Joanna Briggs; Linguistics, Language and Behavior Abstracts; Medline; Scopus; and Web of Science databases, as well as supplemental searches. A total of 204 included studies reported the use of many different measures/methods which measured segmental aspects of speech, with the most common being Allen et al.'s (2001, The reliability of a rating scale for measuring speech intelligibility following pediatric cochlear implantation. Otology and Neurotology, 22(5), 631-633. https://doi.org/10.1097/00129492-200109000-00012) Speech Intelligibility Rating scale. Many studies included insufficient details to determine the measure that was used. Future research should utilize methods/measures with known psychometric validity, provide clear descriptions of the methods/measures used, and consider using more than one measure to account for limitations inherent in different methods of measuring the speech intelligibility of children who are DHH, and consider and discuss the rationale for the measure/method chosen.

Intelligibility in Context Scale: Growth Curves for Typically Developing English-Speaking Children Between Ages 2;6 and 9;11

PURPOSE

The aim of this study was to quantify the clinical utility of the Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS) English version by characterizing the growth patterns of the ICS composite scores and seven ICS individual item scores of typically developing American English-speaking children.

METHOD

Parents of 545 typically developing children aged 2;6-9;11 (years;months) completed the ICS. Using a proportional odds model, we regressed ICS composite scores on age and computed for model-estimated mean and lower quantile ICS composite scores. Logistic regression and proportional odds modeling were utilized to quantify the relationship of individual ICS items and age.

RESULTS

ICS composite scores of typically developing children changed with age, but change was small and incremental, with scores compressed between 3 and 5 across the range of ages. An average child (i.e., on the 50th percentile) is expected to have an ICS composite score of 4 beginning at 3;0 and an ICS composite score of 5 by 6;6. On average, parents gave different intelligibility ratings based on communicative partners, and the rating differences between communicative partners decreased with age.

CONCLUSIONS

Given that ICS scores increase with age, the expected score for average children also increases. A child's age is a main factor for interpreting ICS scores.

Translation and validation of the Intelligibility in Context Scale into Sinhala for adolescents in Sri Lanka with cleft lip and palate

The Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS) is a parent-report screening tool used to measure parents' perceptions of children's functional intelligibility. This tool has been translated into over 60 languages and found to have a good reliability and validity. The purpose of the current study was to translate the ICS into Sinhala (the ICS-SIN), the main language spoken by the Sinhalese people in Sri Lanka, and to validate it with both typically developing (TD) children and children with repaired cleft lip and/or palate (CLP). The translation process followed the forward-backward-forward method. A total of 88 parents of TD children and children with CLP aged 12-15 years old (TD n = 50, CLP n = 38) completed the ICS-SIN questionnaire. Parents of TD and CLP children reported their children's speech as most intelligible to parents and least intelligible to strangers. The ICS-SIN had high internal consistency for both groups (TD α = 0.87, p < 0.05, CLP α = 0.97, p < 0.05). The ICS-SIN total scores and item scores showed significant correlations, indicating a good construct validity. TD participant group's ICS-SIN average mean scores (M = 4.88, SD = 0.29) were significantly higher compared to the CLP ICS-SIN average mean scores (M = 4.64, SD = 0.67) and varied according to gender in both groups, suggesting good discriminant validity. The ICS-SIN has overall good psychometric properties. Therefore, this tool has the potential to be used as a valid parent-rating screening tool for clinical and research purposes in Sri Lanka.

Fijian school students' Fiji English speech sound acquisition

Purpose: The aim of this study was to investigate Fijian students' acquisition of Fiji English speech sounds.Method: Participants were 72 multilingual students (5-10 years) living in Fiji who spoke the Fijian or Fiji Hindi dialects of Fiji English. The students' productions of single words from the Diagnostic Evaluation of Articulation and Phonology (DEAP) were analysed according to dialect using the Children's Independent and Relational Phonological Analysis (CHIRPA).Result: Most English consonants were acquired by 6;0. English consonants that were not in the inventories of Fijian or Fiji Hindi were the last acquired, while those that were common between English and the two languages were some of the earlier acquired consonants. Percentage of consonants correct (PCC) for Fiji English was significantly lower for Grade 1 students (M = 93.01, SD = 0.07) in comparison to Grade 4 students (M = 99.03, SD = 0.01). Plosive and nasal sounds were acquired by 90% of the students earlier than fricative, approximant and affricate sounds, though acquisition of some plosive and fricative sounds varied between Fiji English dialects. All word-initial consonant clusters were acquired by 90% of the students by 9;6, with r-clusters tending to be the latest acquired. The acquisition of word-final consonant clusters was highly variable as students often produced appropriate dialectal variants.Conclusion: Multilingual Fijian children may acquire English specific sounds later than their monolingual English-speaking peers. Consideration of the language environment and analysis of the speech sample with reference to the child's dominant English dialect is imperative for valid identification of speech sound disorder (SSD) in children who speak different dialects of English.

Utility of the Intelligibility in Context Scale for Predicting Speech Intelligibility of Children with Cerebral Palsy

The Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS) is a widely used, efficient tool for describing a child's speech intelligibility. Few studies have explored the relationship between ICS scores and transcription intelligibility scores, which are the gold standard for clinical measurement. This study examined how well ICS composite scores predicted transcription intelligibility scores among children with cerebral palsy (CP), how well individual questions from the ICS differentially predicted transcription intelligibility scores, and how well the ICS composite scores differentiated between children with and without speech motor impairment. Parents of 48 children with CP, who were approximately 13 years of age, completed the ICS. Ninety-six adult naïve listeners provided orthographic transcriptions of children's speech. Transcription intelligibility scores were regressed on ICS composite scores and individual item scores. Dysarthria status was regressed on ICS composite scores. Results indicated that ICS composite scores were moderately strong predictors of transcription intelligibility scores. One individual ICS item differentially predicted transcription intelligibility scores, and dysarthria severity influenced how well ICS composite scores differentiated between children with and without speech motor impairment. Findings suggest that the ICS has potential clinical utility for children with CP, especially when used with other objective measures of speech intelligibility.

Parent rating of intelligibility: A discussion of the construct validity of the Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS) and normative data of the Swedish version of the ICS

BACKGROUND

Intelligibility can be defined as the speakers' ability to convey a message to the listener and it is considered the key functional measure of speech. The Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS) is a parent rating scale used to assess intelligibility in children.

AIMS

To describe normative and validation data on the ICS in Swedish and to investigate how these are related to age, gender and multilingualism.

METHODS & PROCEDURES

Two studies were included. Study 1 included ICS forms from 319 Swedish-speaking children (3:2-9:2 years:months). Study 2 included video recordings and ICS forms from 14 children with speech sound disorder (SSD) and two with typical speech. The video recordings were transcribed in the validation process, resulting in intelligibility reference scores to which ICS scores were correlated.

OUTCOMES & RESULTS

Study 1: The mean value of the ICS for the 319 children was 4.73. There were no differences in ICS score related to age or gender. The children in the multilingual group were significantly older than the monolingual group and had significantly lower ICS scores than the group of monolinguals. Study 2: There was a moderate correlation between the ICS score and the transcription-based intelligibility score, with the two children with typical speech excluded; however, this correlation was not significant.

CONCLUSIONS & IMPLICATIONS

We contribute mean scores and percentiles on the ICS for Swedish-speaking children. The finding that the ICS does not provide valid measures of intelligibility for the included children with SSD suggests that the instrument measures a different construct.

WHAT THIS PAPER ADDS

What is already known on the subject The ICS has been translated to numerous languages and validated against articulation measures in several previous studies. The validity of the Swedish version has been investigated against intelligibility based on transcription of single words. What this paper adds to existing knowledge The study provides normative values of the Swedish version of the ICS for children aged 3-9 years. This is the first study to use a gold standard measure of intelligibility in continuous speech to validate the ICS. The results show a somewhat dubious validity regarding ICS for the group of children with SSD included in the study. What are the potential or actual clinical implications of this work? The ICS's suitability as a measure of intelligibility is questionable; however, it might be of use for speech and language pathologists to give an overview of the parents' view of their child's ability to communicate, in order to make a decision on possible further assessment and intervention. The normative values of the Swedish version of the ICS could be of use in this decision process.

Inteligibilidad: diferentes perspectivas de su concepto y evaluación. Una revisión sistemática

Una adecuada inteligibilidad es un indicador del éxito en la comunicación. Su interferencia, a causa de cualquier patología, debe ser abordada en los objetivos primordiales de la terapia. No obstante, los métodos para su evaluación son poco conocidos. Objetivo: desarrollar una revisión sistemática que describa los métodos empleados en la medición de la inteligibilidad y discutir la conceptualización de este constructo. Metodología: se realiza una búsqueda en las bases de datos PubMed, ScieLo y Science Direct para identificar artículos publicados entre 1990 y 2018. Análisis y discusiones: Se seleccionan 50 investigaciones en inglés, español y portugués, que mostraron preferencia por medidas objetivas de evaluación, por sobre las medidas subjetivas de escala. La inteligibilidad se define mejor como un constructo dependiente de la señal acústica, a diferencia del concepto de comprensibilidad. Esta revisión ofrece información actualizada y organizada para optimizar procedimientos clínicos y científicos de medición de la inteligibilidad. 

Intelligibility in Context Scale: Sensitivity and specificity in the Jamaican context

The present study investigated the sensitivity and specificity of the English Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS) and the ICS-Jamaican Creole (ICS-JC) translation with bilingual preschool-aged Jamaican children. Participants in this study were 262 English-Jamaican Creole simultaneous bilingual children (aged 3;3 to 6;3, M = 4;11, SD = 7.8). The ICS and ICS-JC were administered to parents in auditory form, rather than written form. Although recent evidence has demonstrated the validity and reliability of the ICS as an assessment tool in various languages, further data are needed to determine diagnostic accuracy of the ICS and ICS-JC in Jamaican children. The sensitivity and specificity of both tools were high in this cohort of children, indicating that in the Jamaican context, these versions of the ICS could be used as screening tools to identify children who require further assessment of speech sound disorders. A cut-off score of 4.12 was used for both tools to achieve high sensitivity (0.84) and specificity (0.70) values for the ICS, as well as high sensitivity (0.84) and specificity (0.71) for the ICS-JC. The results of this study also demonstrate that administration of the auditory ICS is a valid way of collecting parent reports about children's speech intelligibility, which has implications for use of the ICS in languages with no written form or with parents who have a low level of literacy in the languages they use. This investigation is relevant not only to this underserved population but broadens knowledge of research-based tools for working with bilingual children.

Normative data and construct validity of a cross-linguistic functional speech outcome, the Intelligibility in Context Scale: Italian (ICS-I)

OBJECTIVES

The Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS) is a parent-report scale, world-wide translated and widely validated, by which parents can rate their child's functional speech intelligibility according to seven different communicative partners. The study aimed to report and discuss the normative data of the Italian version of ICS (ICS-I) in Italian-speaking preschool children, and to investigate whether the age influences the ICS-I scores (construct validity). Socio-economic status (SES) of the family were investigated and compared to parents' ratings on child's speech intelligibility.

METHODS

A cross-sectional observational study was conducted. Italian-speaking children aged 3-6 years (n = 355; mean age = 56.06 months; SD = 9.8 months), without major developmental impairment, were recruited in kindergartens throughout a convenience sampling. Parents completed a self-report form on their family SES (educational level and employment status of fathers and mothers). Children were independently rated by their mothers (ICS-I_m) and fathers (ICS-I_f).

RESULTS

Results show that ICS normative data for the Italian preschool population (ICS-I_m = 4.52; SD = 0.46; ICS-I_f = 4.47; SD = 0.49) are consistent with previous evidence found in other languages, suggesting that ICS could be a potential cross-linguistic tool to assess functional intelligibility. A statistically significant (p < 0.001) improvement in ICS-I score was found with increase of age (construct validity). No evidence of association (p > 0.05) with ICS-I was found for SES family.

CONCLUSION

The study provides normative data of the functional intelligibility assessed by a subjective parental scale. As for other previous international studies, ICS-I normative data suggest that a preschool child without major impairment shows a high degree of speech intelligibility, even if minimal differences of intelligibility are reported for different communicative partners. The current findings support clinicians and researchers in implementing ICS-I in typical and also in atypical population with different SES background and promoting its application as a potential outcome measure in children with Speech Sound Disorders.

Revisiting the Cutoff Criteria of Intelligibility in Context Scale–Traditional Chinese

Background

This study evaluated the validity of the Intelligibility in Context Scale–Traditional Chinese (ICS-TC) and explored its potential as a screening tool for speech sound disorder (SSD) in Cantonese-speaking children in Hong Kong.

Method

The parents of 789 Cantonese-speaking children aged between 2;4 (years;months) and 6;9 completed the ICS-TC. Children were categorized into 2 groups: (a) an SSD group whose initial consonant scores in a standardized assessment were equal to or lower than −1.33 SD and (b) a non-SSD group whose scores were higher than −1.33 SD . The screening accuracy of ICS-TC using a previously proposed cutoff was appraised. A cutoff score for each age group was determined when the effect of age on the ICS-TC mean scores was significant and the corresponding screening accuracy was appraised.

Results

When the previously proposed cutoff was applied to the whole sample, sensitivity and specificity were unsatisfactory. Given the significant age effect, new cutoff scores for each age group were estimated. The new cutoff scores only led to remarkably improved screening accuracy for Age Group 4 (4;0–4;5) but little to no improvement for other age groups.

Conclusions

There is limited clinical use of ICS-TC as a screening tool with a single cutoff score for children at different ages. Its clinical utility might be limited to children of about 4 years of age, where ICS-TC scores demonstrated the best differentiation between children with and without speech concerns. Future studies could refine the screening criteria to further minimize the number of false positives.

Validation of the Intelligibility in Context Scale for Korean-speaking pre-school children

Purpose: The Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS) is a parent-reported screening tool focussed on parents' perception of their child's speech intelligibility. The purposes of this study were to evaluate the psychometric properties of the Korean version of the ICS (ICS-K) and to investigate whether the ICS-K is a useful tool for distinguishing between Korean-speaking children with typical development (TD) and those with speech sound disorder (SSD). Method: A total of 178 Korean-speaking pre-school children (145 children with TD and 33 children with SSD) participated in this study. Speech skills were assessed using the Assessment of Phonology and Articulation for Children. The parents of the children completed the ICS-K. Result: The ICS-K showed high internal consistency and test-retest reliability. Criterion validity was established through a significant correlation between the ICS-K and the percentage of consonants correct. Construct validity was also established through significant correlations between the ICS-K mean scores and the item scores. A discriminant analysis revealed that the ICS-K had high sensitivity (90.9%) and adequate specificity (77.9%) in classifying children into either the TD or the SSD group. Conclusion: The psychometric properties of the ICS-K support its clinical value in measuring functional speech intelligibility in Korean-speaking children with SSD.

Measuring intelligibility in signed languages

Intelligibility of spoken languages is a widely discussed construct; however, intelligibility, as it pertains to signed languages, has rarely been considered. This study provides an initial investigation of the construct of intelligibility in American Sign Language (ASL) and evaluates potential measures for self-report and expert ratings of sign intelligibility that examined the frequency of understanding, amount of understanding, and ease of understanding. Participants were 66 college students (42 Deaf, 24 hearing) who had self-rated ASL skills ranging from poor to excellent. Participants rated their own intelligibility in ASL and then provided a signed language sample through a picture description task. Language samples were reviewed by an expert rater and measures of intelligibility were completed. Results indicated that expert ratings of sign intelligibility across all measures were significantly and positively correlated. Understanding of the signer was predicted by the amount of understanding, frequency of understanding, and ASL production skills, while understanding the picture being described was predicted by ease of understanding and ASL grammar skills. Self- and expert ratings of sign intelligibility using the ASL version of the Intelligibility in Context Scale were not significantly different. Self-report of sign intelligibility for viewers of different familiarity using the ICS-ASL was found not to be feasible due to many participants not being in contact with ASL users in the relationships defined by the measure. In conclusion, this preliminary investigation suggests that sign intelligibility is a construct worthy of further investigation.

An Investigation of the Clinical Use of a Single-Word Procedure to Assess Intelligibility (Swedish Test of Intelligibility for Children) and an Evaluation of the Validity and Reliability of the Intelligibility in Context Scale

Purpose Intelligibility is a core concept of speech-language pathology, central both to the assessment of speech disorders and to intervention in such disorders. One purpose of this study was to investigate the reliability and usability of a single-word assessment procedure, the Swedish Test of Intelligibility for Children (STI-CH), in a clinical setting. Another purpose was to investigate the validity and reliability of an assessment method designed to assess functional intelligibility: the Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS). Method Thirty children aged 4;1-10;1 years;months were recruited from speech-language pathology clinics in Western Sweden. Each child's treating speech-language pathologist served as listener in the STI-CH assessment while the ICS was completed by each child's parents. External listeners (2 last-year speech-language pathology students) were used to assess the validity of the speech-language pathology. Results The mean duration of the test procedure for the STI-CH was about 19 min, and 57% of the test sessions were reported as difficult. There was a weak but statistically significant correlation between the results from the STI-CH and the ICS ( r = .40, p < .05), and both methods showed high reliability in terms of interlistener reliability (intraclass correlation exceeding .97) and internal consistency, respectively. Conclusions The STI-CH had high reliability and was time efficient but had some procedural problems. The ICS had moderate validity but high reliability. The STI-CH is promising for clinical use but needs to be developed further. The validity of the ICS can be discussed and needs to be further investigated.

The UNICEF/Washington Group Child Functioning Module-Accuracy, Inter-Rater Reliability and Cut-Off Level for Disability Disaggregation of Fiji's Education Management Information System

This paper explores the validity (sensitivity and specificity) of different cut-off levels of the UNICEF/Washington Group Child Functioning Module (CFM) and the inter-rater reliability between teachers and parents as proxy respondents, for disaggregating Fiji's education management information system (EMIS) by disability. The method used was a cross-sectional diagnostic accuracy study comparing CFM items to standard clinical assessments for 472 primary school aged students in Fiji. Whilst previous domain-specific results showed "good" to "excellent" accuracy of the CFM domains seeing, hearing, walking and speaking, newer analysis shows only "fair" to "poor" accuracy of the cognitive domains (learning, remembering and focusing attention) and "fair" of the overall CFM (area under the Receiver Operating Characteristic curve: 0.763 parent responses, 0.786 teacher responses). Severe impairments are reported relatively evenly across CFM response categories "some difficulty", "a lot of difficulty" and "cannot do at all". Most moderate impairments are reported as "some difficulty". The CFM provides a core component of data required for disaggregating Fiji's EMIS by disability. However, choice of cut-off level and mixture of impairment severity reported across response categories are challenges. The CFM alone is not accurate enough to determine funding eligibility. For identifying children with disabilities, the CFM should be part of a broader data collection including learning and support needs data and undertaking eligibility verification visits.

Validity and reliability of the Intelligibility in Context Scale: European Portuguese version

The purpose of the study was to evaluate the validity, reliability, sensitivity and specificity of the European-Portuguese version of the Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS-EP). Seventy-six children (age: M = 60.6, SD = 8.1 months), 25 having a parent or teacher concern about how they talked and 51 with no concern, were assessed with the phonetic-phonological test (TFF-ALPE) to calculate the following severity measures: percentage of phonemes correct (PPC), percentage of consonants correct (PCC), and percentage of vowels correct (PVC). Parents also filled out a questionnaire about their child's development (e.g. concern about how the child talks). The ICS was then completed by parents to estimate their children's intelligibility with different communicative partners. The results showed that item-level scores were different according to communicative partners. The mean ICS score for the whole sample was 4.5 (SD = 0.6), showing that children were "usually" to "always" intelligible. The ICS had excellent internal consistency (α = 0.96). Children with parental concern about their speech presented significantly lower mean scores (M = 3.91, SD = 0.59) than children without parental concerns (M = 4.78, SD = 0.36). There was a positive correlation between the ICS scores and PPC (r = .655), PCC (r = .654), and PVC (r = .588). A simple linear model was also obtained between the ICS mean score and the severity measures analyzed. High values were obtained for sensitivity (0.80) and specificity (0.84), using a cut-off point of 4.36. We conclude that the ICS-EP has good psychometric properties, suggesting it to be a valid tool for estimating children's intelligibility when talking with different communicative partners. Therefore, this version of the ICS can be used as a screening measure for children's speech intelligibility.

Impact of communication partner familiarity and speech accuracy on parents' ratings of their child for the Intelligibility in Context Scale: Dutch

PURPOSE

The aim of this study was to examine the role of familiarity of a communication partner on Dutch parents' perception of their child's intelligibility, for children with typically-developing speech (TD) or speech sound disorder (SSD).

METHOD

Participants were 67 Dutch-speaking children (48-84 months), 48 with TD and 19 with SSD. Item scores on the parent-rated Intelligibility in Context Scale: Dutch (ICS-NL) were compared between groups and related to naive listeners' ratings of children's intelligibility (IR), and a measure of speech accuracy (i.e. percentage of consonants correct-adjusted, PCC-A).

RESULT

Statistical analysis yielded a significant Group by Familiarity interaction on the ICS-NL. Parents rated the intelligibility of their child with SSD as higher with more familiar communication partners than less familiar, more so than parents of children with TD. In the SSD group, IR was more strongly correlated with ICS-NL item scores for less familiar partners. PCC-A was only correlated with ICS-NL item 7 (strangers).

CONCLUSION

Parents perceive their children as more intelligible with people in close relationships, likely due to their higher familiarity with the child's speech. Children's relationships should be considered with respect to communicative participation. PCC-A may be a less reliable predictor of participation in family and community life.

Measurement accuracy: Enabling human rights for Fijian students with speech difficulties

PURPOSE

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights enshrines the rights to communication and education and measuring access to these rights for children with disabilities is fundamental. The UNICEF/Washington Group Child Functioning Module (CFM) is being promoted to measure progress against the Sustainable Development Goals for children with disabilities. This cross-sectional diagnostic accuracy study in Fiji compares parent and teacher CFM responses to the Intelligibility in Context Scale for 463 primary-aged students with and without speech difficulties.

METHOD

Receiver operating characteristic curves were constructed to analyse CFM accuracy and determine optimal cut-off points; inter-rater reliability between teachers and parents was calculated.

RESULT

Parent responses to the CFM speech questions achieved an area under the curve of 0.98, indicating "excellent" diagnostic accuracy. Teachers achieved 0.92 ("very good"). The Youden Index identified the optimal cut-off as "some difficulty".

CONCLUSION

The CFM appears effective when used by parents or teachers for distinguishing between children with and without speech difficulties. While identified as the optimal cut-off statistically, the "some difficulty" category identifies too many children without speech difficulties to be simplistically applied to funding eligibility. The CFM should be used as a screening tool, followed by further assessment to confirm eligibility.

Communication Capacity Research in the Majority World: Supporting the human right to communication specialist services

Receipt of accessible and appropriate specialist services and resources by all people with communication and/or swallowing disability is a human right; however, it is a right rarely achieved in either Minority or Majority World contexts. This paper considers communication specialists' efforts to provide sustainable services for people with communication difficulties living in Majority World countries. The commentary draws on human rights literature, particularly Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Communication Capacity Research program that includes: (1) gathering knowledge from policy and literature; (2) gathering knowledge from the community; (3) understanding speech, language and literacy use and proficiency; and (4) developing culturally and linguistically appropriate resources and assessments. To inform the development of resources and assessments that could be used by speech-language pathologists as well as other communication specialists in Fiji, the Communication Capacity Research program involved collection and analysis of data from multiple sources including 144 community members, 75 school students and their families, and 25 teachers. The Communication Capacity Research program may be applicable for achieving the development of evidence-based, culturally and linguistically sustainable SLP services in similar contexts.

Validation of the Intelligibility in Context Scale for Jamaican Creole-Speaking Preschoolers

PURPOSE

To describe validation of the Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS; McLeod, Harrison, & McCormack, 2012a) and ICS-Jamaican Creole (ICS-JC; McLeod, Harrison, & McCormack, 2012b) in a sample of typically developing 3- to 6-year-old Jamaicans.

METHOD

One-hundred and forty-five preschooler-parent dyads participated in the study. Parents completed the 7-item ICS (n = 145) and ICS-JC (n = 98) to rate children's speech intelligibility (5-point scale) across communication partners (parents, immediate family, extended family, friends, acquaintances, strangers). Preschoolers completed the Diagnostic Evaluation of Articulation and Phonology (DEAP; Dodd, Hua, Crosbie, Holm, & Ozanne, 2006) in English and Jamaican Creole to establish speech-sound competency. For this sample, we examined validity and reliability (interrater, test-rest, internal consistency) evidence using measures of speech-sound production: (a) percentage of consonants correct, (b) percentage of vowels correct, and (c) percentage of phonemes correct.

RESULTS

ICS and ICS-JC ratings showed preschoolers were always (5) to usually (4) understood across communication partners (ICS, M = 4.43; ICS-JC, M = 4.50). Both tools demonstrated excellent internal consistency (α = .91), high interrater, and test-retest reliability. Significant correlations between the two tools and between each measure and language-specific percentage of consonants correct, percentage of vowels correct, and percentage of phonemes correct provided criterion-validity evidence. A positive correlation between the ICS and age further strengthened validity evidence for that measure.

CONCLUSIONS

Both tools show promising evidence of reliability and validity in describing functional speech intelligibility for this group of typically developing Jamaican preschoolers.

Validation and norming of the Intelligibility in Context Scale in Northern Viet Nam

Vietnamese is one of the 20 most commonly spoken languages in the world; however, there are no standardised tools to assess Vietnamese children's speech. This study aimed to validate and norm the Vietnamese version of the Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS-VN). Data were collected from parents of 181 children (aged 2;0-5;11) living in Ha Noi, Northern Viet Nam. The mean ICS-VN score was 4.43 (out of a maximum of 5), indicating that children were 'usually' to 'always' intelligible; however, item-level scores demonstrated significant differences between communication partners. Children with parental concerns about speech and language had significantly lower mean scores than children without parental concerns. Scores also differed by children's age, parents' occupation and mothers' education level but not by sex of child or fathers' education level. The ICS-VN had good psychometric properties indicating it to be a valid tool for use with Vietnamese-speaking children in Northern Viet Nam.