title: Audiovisual sentence repetition as a clinical criterion for auditory development in Persian-language children with hearing loss.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  It is important for clinician such as speech-language pathologists and audiologists to develop more efficient procedures to assess the development of auditory, speech and language skills in children using hearing aid and/or cochlear implant compared to their peers with normal hearing. So, the aim of study was the comparison of the performance of 5-to-7-year-old Persian-language children with and without hearing loss in visual-only, auditory-only, and audiovisual presentation of sentence repetition task.
  
  
  METHODS
  The research was administered as a cross-sectional study. The sample size was 92 Persian 5-7 year old children including: 60 with normal hearing and 32 with hearing loss. The children with hearing loss were recruited from Soroush rehabilitation center for Persian-language children with hearing loss in Shiraz, Iran, through consecutive sampling method. All the children had unilateral cochlear implant or bilateral hearing aid. The assessment tool was the Sentence Repetition Test. The study included three computer-based experiments including visual-only, auditory-only, and audiovisual. The scores were compared within and among the three groups through statistical tests in α = 0.05.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The score of sentence repetition task between V-only, A-only, and AV presentation was significantly different in the three groups; in other words, the highest to lowest scores belonged respectively to audiovisual, auditory-only, and visual-only format in the children with normal hearing (P < 0.01), cochlear implant (P < 0.01), and hearing aid (P < 0.01). In addition, there was no significant correlationship between the visual-only and audiovisual sentence repetition scores in all the 5-to-7-year-old children (r = 0.179, n = 92, P = 0.088), but audiovisual sentence repetition scores were found to be strongly correlated with auditory-only scores in all the 5-to-7-year-old children (r = 0.943, n = 92, P = 0.000).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  According to the study's findings, audiovisual integration occurs in the 5-to-7-year-old Persian children using hearing aid or cochlear implant during sentence repetition similar to their peers with normal hearing. Therefore, it is recommended that audiovisual sentence repetition should be used as a clinical criterion for auditory development in Persian-language children with hearing loss.
authors.affiliation: Department of Speech Therapy, School of Rehabilitation Sciences, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran; Rehabilitation Sciences Research Center, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran. Electronic address: oryadi@sums.ac.ir.
authors.forename: Mohammad Majid
authors.initials: MM
authors.lastname: Oryadi-Zanjani
authors.affiliation: Department of Speech Therapy, School of Rehabilitation Sciences, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran; Rehabilitation Sciences Research Center, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran.
authors.forename: Maryam
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Vahab
authors.affiliation: Department of Speech Therapy, School of Rehabilitation Sciences, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran.
authors.forename: Zahra
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Rahimi
authors.affiliation: Department of Speech Therapy, School of Rehabilitation Sciences, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran.
authors.forename: Anis
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mayahi
mesh_terms: D001307:Auditory Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003054:Cochlear Implants; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D003638:Deafness / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D005260:Female; D006310:Hearing Aids; D006801:Humans; D007492:Iran; D007804:Language Development; D008297:Male; D013067:Speech Perception / Q000502:physiology; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology*
keywords: Audiologist; Audiovisual sentence repetition; Hearing loss; Persian-language children; Speech-language pathologist