Some etiologic factors of speech comprehension disturbances

Disturbances of speech comprehension were analyzed in a prospective study of 97 children, aged from 23 to 77 months. Pregnancy, birth and early psychomotor development were normal for all the children and no focus of neurological deficit was found. A tonal audiometer did not detect any auditory disturbances, and psychological testing with non-verbal tests showed normal mental functioning for the age. In this group of selected subjects, family and personal case histories were taken. In addition, a detailed neurological physical examination, standard EEG and auditory evoked potentials, and a psychiatric examination were performed during several appointments. The results showed that disturbances in speech comprehension were more frequent in boys, and that in 13.4% of cases it was caused by pervasive developmental disturbances and in 41.24% of cases by external stimulating factors of speech development (pedagogy, social and emotional stimulation and growing up in a multilingual community). The study emphasizes the importance of non-verbal methods for the study of speech and the use of auditory evoked potentials.