A Phase 2 interventional study of Visual-acoustic biofeedback in Speech Sound Disorder, sponsored by New York University. Recruiting at 3 sites in United States. Open to female participants aged 9 Years to 17 Years. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2026-11-03.
Sponsored by New York University · Phase 2, Interventional, and Treatment
Children with speech sound disorder show diminished intelligibility in spoken communication and may thus be perceived as less capable than peers, with negative consequences for both socioemotional and socioeconomic outcomes. New technologies have the potential to transform interventions for speech sound disorder, but there is a lack of rigorous evidence to substantiate this promise. This research will meet a public health need by systematically evaluating the efficacy of visual-acoustic biofeedback intervention delivered in-person versus via telepractice.
The objective of this study is to test the hypothesis that treatment incorporating visual-acoustic biofeedback can be delivered via telepractice without a significant loss of efficacy. Participants will be randomly assigned to receive identical treatment either via online telepractice or in the laboratory setting. The same software for visual-acoustic biofeedback, staRt, will be used in both conditions. Participants' progress in treatment will be evaluated based on blinded listeners' perceptual ratings of probes produced before and after treatment. Pre and post treatment evaluations will be carried out in person for all participants.
This study aims to test the working hypothesis that biofeedback treatment delivery via telepractice will not be associated with a reduction in efficacy that exceeds a maximum acceptable value determined a priori. In a prospective randomized controlled non-inferiority trial, children will be randomly assigned to receive a standard course of visual-acoustic biofeedback intervention delivered in-person or via telepractice. Progress will be measured with blinded listeners' ratings of untreated words produced before and after treatment. A survey will also be administered before and after treatment to assess changes in participants' participation and socio-emotional well-being, as well as participants' and caregivers' satisfaction with the therapy experience.
46 studies on the registry are indexed under Speech Sound Disorder; 16 are open to participants now.
This study's planned enrollment of 76 is above the median of 40 across 39 interventional studies indexed under Speech Sound Disorder.
Browse Speech Sound Disorder studies →New York University is the lead sponsor of 123 studies on the registry; 32 are open to participants now.
Counted across the registry records on this site, refreshed daily.
Go through the criteria one by one — yes, no or not sure — and take the list to your doctor or the study team. Kept in this browser only.
Exclusion Criteria:
Underlined terms in the criteria open these too. Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Judged by the study doctor to matter for your health or for the study. It is a doctor’s decision, so ask the study team if you are unsure whether something counts.
Clinically significant
Judged by the study doctor to matter for your health or for the study. It is a doctor’s decision, so ask the study team if you are unsure whether something counts.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Participants will receive visual-acoustic biofeedback treatment from a clinician in a private, password-protected WebRTC room.
Behavioral: Visual-acoustic biofeedback
Participants will receive visual-acoustic biofeedback treatment from a clinician in a private room in research space at one of the two clinical research sites.
Behavioral: Visual-acoustic biofeedback
Behavioral: Visual-acoustic biofeedback In visual-acoustic biofeedback treatment, the elements of traditional treatment (auditory models and verbal descriptions of articulator placement) are enhanced with a dynamic display of the speech signal in the form of the real-time LPC (Linear Predictive Coding) spectrum. The web-based software staRt will be used for intervention delivery.
Also known as: staRt app
Percentage of "Correct" Ratings by Blinded Untrained Listeners for /r/ Sounds Produced in Word Probes
To assess generalization of treatment gains to untreated words, participants will be assessed with standard probes (30 words \[considered the primary target\], 20 syllables, and 10 sentences containing /r/ in various phonetic contexts). Stimuli in each probe will be presented individually in randomized order with blocking by stimulus type (word, syllable, sentence). Individual words will be isolated from the audio record of each word probe and presented in randomized order for binary rating (correct/incorrect) by 9 untrained listeners who are blind to treatment condition and time point, but will see the written representation of each target word. The proportion of "correct" ratings for each token will be used as the primary measure of perceptually rated accuracy.
Time frame: Before the initiation of treatment and again after the end of all treatment (10 weeks later)
1. Survey evaluating impacts of speech disorder on participants' social, emotional, and academic well-being.
This survey asks participants to report the impact of speech disorder on their child's social, emotional, and academic well-being. Parents are asked to circle a number from 1 to 5. For all questions, a higher score indicates a greater degree of negative impact of speech disorder on social, emotional, or academic well-being. An impact score will be calculated as described in a previous published study (Hitchcock, Harel, \& McAllister Byun, 2015).
Time frame: Before the initiation of treatment and again after the end of all treatment (10 weeks later)
Not enrolling at this site.
Plan to share: Yes — A manual of procedures and materials for treatment and clinician training will be released through the Open Science Framework (OSF). Complete de-identified data and analysis scripts on OSF will also be released when the study is completed. OSF as projects are completed
Supporting information: Study protocol, Analytic code
Time frame: Data will be shared within 6 months of the study end date (7/31/28) and will be made available indefinitely.
Access criteria: Publicly accessible
Data sharing details ↗ · osf.io
Started Jul 2024 (actual). Primary completion is estimated for Jun 2028, 47 months after the start.
How these figures are worked out, and which studies are left out of them.
From the registry record's own update history. This site started tracking changes on Sep 25, 2026; for anything earlier, see the record history on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗
Eligibility is decided by the study team. Share this record with your doctor or contact the team directly.
No contact was published for this record. The registry link below has the sponsor’s details.
Get an email when the registry record changes — status, dates, results — or when someone posts here.
Sign in to followQuestions and observations about this study, from anyone following it. Not medical advice, and not a channel to the study team — their contact details are on the registry record.
Sign in to join the discussion. Reading takes no account; posting does. You choose a display name, and a pseudonym is the default.
Nothing here yet. If you are running this trial, taking part in it, or weighing whether to, this is the place to say so.