Teachers' attitudes towards children with voice problems

Abstract

Voice disorders affects at least 6% of the general population (Marge, 1991). Similar high prevalence figures of voice disorders have also been reported in the pediatric population - with a rate of at least 6% (McNamara & Perry, 1994) to 17% (Akif Kilic, Okur, Yildirim, & Guzelsoy, 2004). The literature has reported that compared to vocally healthy children, children with voice problems are perceived more negatively on their personality and physical appearance traits by peers, university students and adolescents. To date, there have not been empirical studies which look into teachers' perceptions of children with voice problems and therefore, whether similar negative stereotyping exists among teachers remains to be investigated. Such information has significant educational implications. Because teachers play an important role in a child's whole-person development, negative attitudes of teachers towards dysphonic children can adversely impact on the child's academic, social and psychological well-being development. The AIM of the present study was to examine teachers' attitudes towards children with voice problems. Two groups of listeners participated in this study. The first group of listeners consisted of 15 primary school teachers (3 males and 12 females; mean age=25.0 years, range=21-30 years). Another group of listeners comprised of 15 undergraduate students and they served as controls (8 males and 7 females; mean age=21.9 years, range=18-25 years). Both groups of listeners were asked to listen to recordings of 12 children with six dysphonic children (mean age=9.42 years, range=7.5-11 years) and six normal-voiced children (mean age=9.33 years, range=8-11 years). The listeners then rated non-speech characteristics of the children speakers including personality, social desirability and physical appearance on a 22-item semantic differential scale anchored with bipolar adjective pairs. RESULTS revealed that both groups of listeners judged children with voice problems significantly more negative than children without voice problems (p=0.001). The mean attitude ratings obtained from school teachers and university students were similar and were not significantly different from each other (p>0.05). The results further support that voice problems can adversely affect listeners' perceptions of a child's non-speech characteristics. Voice problems in children warrant attention and should not be underestimated.