Dataset Information

The Selective Mutism Questionnaire: Data from typically developing children and children with selective mutism.

ABSTRACT: The core symptom of the anxiety disorder selective mutism (SM) is absence of speech in specific situations, such as at school. The most commonly used standardized instruments to assess speaking behavior are the parent-rated Selective Mutism Questionnaire (SMQ) and the teacher-rated School Speech Questionnaire (SSQ), scored from 0 to 3, indicating that speaking behavior never, seldom, often, and always occur. They were developed to assess severity of mutism and potential effects of treatment. However, prospective data on speaking behavior in typically developing children (TDs) are missing in the literature. The main aim of this study was to present data from TDs over time with previously reported data from children treated for SM, as a comparison. Participants were 64 children aged 3-9?years, 32 TDs who were a matched control group to 32 children with SM. At baseline, the mean SMQ and SSQ scores were ?2.5 in TDs and 0.5 in children with SM. The TDs did not show significant changes over time, while significantly increased speech was found in children with SM after treatment. Thus, our findings support the use of the SMQ/SSQ to assess baseline SM severity and to evaluate potential treatment effects in future studies.

SUBMITTER: Oerbeck B

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7528533 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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The Selective Mutism Questionnaire: Data from typically developing children and children with selective mutism.

Oerbeck Beate B Overgaard Kristin Romvig KR Bergman R Lindsey RL Pripp Are Hugo AH Kristensen Hanne H

Clinical child psychology and psychiatry 20200413 4

The core symptom of the anxiety disorder selective mutism (SM) is absence of speech in specific situations, such as at school. The most commonly used standardized instruments to assess speaking behavior are the parent-rated Selective Mutism Questionnaire (SMQ) and the teacher-rated School Speech Questionnaire (SSQ), scored from 0 to 3, indicating that speaking behavior never, seldom, often, and always occur. They were developed to assess severity of mutism and potential effects of treatment. How ...[more]

PMID: 32281879

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Project description:Despite the well-established involvement of both sensory ("bottom-up") and cognitive ("top-down") processes in literacy, the extent to which auditory or cognitive (memory or attention) learning transfers to phonological and reading skills remains unclear. Most research has demonstrated learning of the trained task or even learning transfer to a closely related task. However, few studies have reported "far-transfer" to a different domain, such as the improvement of phonological and reading skills following auditory or cognitive training. This study assessed the effectiveness of auditory, memory or attention training on far-transfer measures involving phonological and reading skills in typically developing children. Mid-transfer was also assessed through untrained auditory, attention and memory tasks. Sixty 5- to 8-year-old children with normal hearing were quasi-randomly assigned to one of five training groups: attention group (AG), memory group (MG), auditory sensory group (SG), placebo group (PG; drawing, painting), and a control, untrained group (CG). Compliance, mid-transfer and far-transfer measures were evaluated before and after training. All trained groups received 12 x 45-min training sessions over 12 weeks. The CG did not receive any intervention. All trained groups, especially older children, exhibited significant learning of the trained task. On pre- to post-training measures (test-retest), most groups exhibited improvements on most tasks. There was significant mid-transfer for a visual digit span task, with highest span in the MG, relative to other groups. These results show that both sensory and cognitive (memory or attention) training can lead to learning in the trained task and to mid-transfer learning on a task (visual digit span) within the same domain as the trained tasks. However, learning did not transfer to measures of language (reading and phonological awareness), as the PG and CG improved as much as the other trained groups. Further research is required to investigate the effects of various stimuli and lengths of training on the generalization of sensory and cognitive learning to literacy skills.

Project description:BackgroundSilence in certain situations represents the core symptom of selective mutism (SM). However, it is unclear what additional symptoms are part of this disorder. Although knowledge of symptoms is essential for diagnostics and intervention, to date, only scarce research exists on circumscribed symptoms of SM. Given the large overlap between SM and social anxiety disorder (SAD), it remains also unclear which symptoms can differentiate both disorders.MethodsA network analysis of potential symptoms of SM was performed based on a mixed sample of N = 899 children and adolescents with and without indication of SM (n = 629 with silence in certain situations). In a preliminary analysis, we demonstrated that children with and without silence in certain situations do not differ with respect to their network structure, justifying an analysis on the entire mixed sample. Possible communities (symptom clusters) within the network and thus potential latent variables were examined, and symptoms were analyzed in terms of their centrality (the extent to which they are associated with other symptoms in the network). To investigate the differentiability of symptoms of the SM network from symptoms of SAD, we computed a network that additionally contains symptoms of SAD.ResultsIn the resulting network on symptoms of SM, silence was, as expected, the symptom with the highest centrality. We identified two communities (symptom cluster): (1) symptoms associated with the fear response of freezing, (2) symptoms associated with speech production and avoidance. SM network symptoms and SAD symptoms largely formed two separate symptom clusters, with only selectivity of speaking behavior (more talkative at home and taciturn or mute outside the home) falling into a common cluster with SAD symptoms.ConclusionsSilence appears to have been confirmed by analysis as a core symptom of SM. Additional anxiety-related symptoms, such as avoidance behavior or motor inhibition associated with freezing, seem to co-occur with silence. The two communities of SM potentially indicate different mechanisms of silence. The symptoms of SM appear to be distinguishable from those of SAD, although there seems to be overlap in terms of difficulty speaking in situations outside the home.

Dataset Information

The Selective Mutism Questionnaire: Data from typically developing children and children with selective mutism.

Publications

The Selective Mutism Questionnaire: Data from typically developing children and children with selective mutism.

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