title: Examining the relationship between speech intensity and self-rated communicative effectiveness in individuals with Parkinson's disease and hypophonia.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To examine the relationship between speech intensity and self-ratings of communicative effectiveness in speakers with Parkinson's disease (PD) and hypophonia. An additional purpose was to evaluate if self-ratings of communicative effectiveness made by participants with PD differed from ratings made by primary communication partners.
  
  
  METHODS
  Thirty participants with PD and 15 healthy older adults completed the Communication Effectiveness Survey. Thirty primary communication partners rated the communicative effectiveness of his/her partner with PD. Speech intensity was calculated for participants with PD and control participants based on conversational utterances.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Results revealed significant differences between groups in conversational speech intensity (p=.001). Participants with PD self-rated communicative effectiveness significantly lower than control participants (p=.000). Correlational analyses revealed a small but non-significant relationship between speech intensity and communicative effectiveness for participants with PD (r=0.298, p=.110) and control participants (r=0.327, p=.234). Self-ratings of communicative effectiveness made participants with PD was not significantly different than ratings made by primary communication partners (p=.20).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Obtaining information on communicative effectiveness may help to broaden outcome measurement and may aid in the provision of educational strategies. Findings also suggest that communicative effectiveness may be a separate and a distinct construct that cannot necessarily be predicted from the severity of hypophonia.
authors.affiliation: School of Communication Sciences and Disorders, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada. Electronic address: adykstr3@uwo.ca.
authors.forename: Allyson D
authors.initials: AD
authors.lastname: Dykstra
authors.affiliation: School of Communication Sciences and Disorders, Department of Clinical Neurological Sciences, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada. Electronic address: sadams@uwo.ca.
authors.forename: Scott G
authors.initials: SG
authors.lastname: Adams
authors.affiliation: Department of Clinical Neurological Sciences, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada. Electronic address: Mandar.Jog@lhsc.on.ca.
authors.forename: Mandar
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Jog
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D004401:Dysarthria / Q000209:etiology / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010300:Parkinson Disease / Q000150:complications / Q000523:psychology*; D012647:Self-Assessment; D013065:Speech Intelligibility; D013067:Speech Perception
keywords: Communicative effectiveness; Hypophonia; Parkinson's disease; Speaker-listener dyads; Speech intensity