Ages: 5 through 21

Testing Time: 60 to 90 Minutes

Description:

The TAPS-4 provides information about language processing and comprehension skills across three intersecting areas: phonological processing, auditory memory and listening comprehension. These areas underpin the development of effective listening and communication skills, and are critical to the development of higher order language skills, including literacy skills.

The TAPS-4 features new subtests along with revisions to subtests from the TAPS-3, fully updated norms, and an expanded age range. The TAPS-4 subtests were also reorganized into Index and Supplemental subtests, reducing testing burden and increasing flexibility in administration.

The TAPS-4 also features audio administration for the subtests in which proper pronunciation of speech sounds is critical, providing a greater degree of standardization and accuracy during the testing process.

The TAPS-4 now has 11 subtests. The subtests are organized into three composites. The scores for the subtests are reported as scale scores. The scores for the composites are reported as indices:

Phonological Processing Composite:

• Word (Pair) Discrimination: Assesses an individual's ability to discriminate whether a given word pair is the same or different

• Phonological Deletion: Assesses an individual's ability to manipulate phonemes within words

• Phonological Blending: Assesses an individual's ability to synthesize a word given the individual phonemes

• Syllabic Blending (Supplemental): Assesses an individual's ability to synthesize a nonsense word given the individual syllables

Auditory Memory Composite:

• Number Memory Forward: Assesses an individual's ability to recall an auditory sequence of numbers in the given order

• Word Memory: Assesses an individual's ability to recall an auditory sequence of words in the given order

• Sentence Memory: Assesses an individual's ability to recall a spoken sentence

• Number Memory Reversed (Supplemental): Assesses an individual's ability to recall an auditory sequence of numbers in the reverse order

Listening Comprehension Composite:

• Processing Oral Directions (without background noise): Assesses an individuals ability to process and recall oral directions when presented in quiet listening conditions

• Auditory Comprehension: Assesses an individual's ability to comprehend oral language at the sentence and narrative level, including literal recall, inference, and higher order language tasks, such as idioms and figurative language

• Auditory Figure–Ground (Processing oral directions with background noise) (Supplemental): Assesses an individual's ability to process and recall oral directions when presented with competing background noise