A Pressure-Flow Technique for Quantifying Temporal Patterns of Palatopharyngeal Closure

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to demonstrate a new application of the pressure-flow technique and to determine whether the temporal characteristics of aerodynamic data associated with single-word utterances could reliably differentiate speakers with adequate palatopharyngeal closure from those with inadequacy. The groups included 10 normals, 20 patients with cleft palate who had adequate closure (0.0-0.09 cmz), 20 patients who had borderline closure (0.10—0.19 cmz), and 20 patients who had inadequate closure (>0.19 cmz). The test sound was the nasal-plosive blend /mp/ in the word hamper. The data were processed by a PDP 11/34 computer. The results demonstrate the utility of the pressure-flow technique for studying timing parameters associated with speech and reveal that patients with adequacy of closure can be differentiated from those with inadequacy using timing criteria. Additionally, the data suggest that the perception of nasal resonance in the group with borderline closure appears to be influenced by the timing of closure. There is substantial evidence that speech performance is adversely affected by pal— atopharyngeal inadequacy, although the relationship between the degree of inadequacy and the severity of the resultant speech disorder does not appear to be linear (Subtelny and Subtelny, 1959; Shelton et a1, 1964; Brandt and Morris, 1965; Barnes and Morris, 1967). Warren (1979) has reported that the difference between