The investigation of executive functions of 48-72 month-old children with speech sound disorders

In the study, executive function skill performances of children with speech sound disorder (SSD) were examined according to age, gender and SSD severity level variables. This study a the cross-sectional survey study, one of the quantitative research methods. 22 girls and 44 boys, whose native language was Turkish, between the ages of 48 and 72 months, participated in the research. Turkish Early Language Development Test, Articulation Subtest of SST (The Turkish Articulation and Phonology Test) and Childhood Executive Function Inventory-Teacher Form were used as data collection tools. The analysis was made with the Jamovi program. Independent sample t-test and Mann-Whitney U test, one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) were used to analyze qualitative data. The findings showed that the executive function skill performance, working memory performance and inhibitory control performance of the 48-59 month age group and the boy group were behind the 60-72 month and girl group, respectively, according to the age variable and the male group according to the gender variable. Additionally, it was concluded that as the severity level of SSD increased, executive function skill performance, working memory performance and inhibitory control performance decreased.