Language and Learning

The Tomatis method

Research on learning, language and behaviour

The Tomatis Method has been rigorously tested and found to be highly effective in the treatment of learning difficulties and behavioural problems.

In 1999 Tim Gilmor published a meta-analysis based on five studies comprising 231 children. The study was published in the International Journal of Listening (1). A meta-analysis is a very powerful statistical tool, used widely in medical research. It allows the researcher to combine the data coming from several studies and reaches conclusions far more precise than the original studies. The study demonstrated that the Tomatis Method significantly improves:

• Linguistic abilities
• Psychomotor abilities
• The capacity for personal and social adaptation
• Cognitive abilities
• The capacity for listening

The meta-analysis was based on the publications of the following researchers:

• Dr Tim Gilmor, who studied 102 children at the Tomatis Centre of Toronto (2,3).
• Dr Byron Rourke, of the University of Windsor, Ontario, who studied 25 children with learning problems, between 9 and 14 years of age, following them over the period of a year (4).
• Dr Barbara Wilson of the North Shore University Hospital, who studied 26 children of pre-school age with language problems, over a period of 9 months.
• Dr John Kershner of the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, who followed the progress of 32 children with developmental delay, between 8 and 12 years of age (6,7).
• Peter Mould, head of the support teachers of Brickwall House, East Sussex, who followed the progress of 2 groups of 46 strongly dyslexic boys, between 10 and 15 years of age, over a period of 2 years (8).

The Tomatis Centre of Toronto, in Canada, also studied the results obtained with Listening Therapy by 400 children and adolescents. These all had a well-documented history of learning problems, as well as a level of delay in the psycho-pedagogical tests. The results of the treatment were classified by the parents. In this test, 95% of the parents answered that the programme had helped their children. The parents saw improvements in the following areas:

At a follow-up six months after the programme, 83% of the children had maintained the progress and had also continued to obtain further improvements. 14% had maintained some of the improvements. Only 3% had maintained none of the improvements.

A Canadian researcher, H.A. Stutt (9), concluded that the Tomatis Listening Programme produces benefits beyond what one might expect from maturation and from support education. The benefits mentioned by Stutt include:

A significant increase of the I.Q.

Improvement in reading

Improvement in perceptual processing

Increase of scholastic abilities

A sense of general adaptation

Development of communicative capacities

Improved capacity to express thoughts and feelings verbally

During the 1980s, the Tomatis Programme began to be used in several French schools through funding from the Ministry of Public Education. The children were, and are, chosen on the basis of their high degree of scholastic difficulty.

The positive results obtained have prompted the schools to continue the programme in the following years as well, also on the insistence of the parents, who have seen positive and lasting changes in the lives of their children.

In 1983, De Bruto (10) directed a carefully controlled study to investigate the efficacy of the Tomatis Method on subjects with a strong developmental delay. Thirty residents of the Witrand Care and Rehabilitation Center (South Africa), between 4 and 14 years of age, previously diagnosed as strongly delayed in development, but with the capacity to sit and to walk, were assigned at random to three groups, which received:

• Group A: auditory stimulation (Tomatis) and a programme of sensorimotor stimulation.
• Group B: musical stimulation (without the Tomatis effect) plus the same programme of sensory stimulation as group A.
• Group C: no treatment.

The psychological tests were the Bailey Scales of Infant Development and a measurement of responsiveness. The results indicated that both experimental groups manifested an increase of mental age, but the increase in the group with Tomatis stimulation (group A) was significantly higher than in group B. No change was found in group C.

Moreover, before the stimulation programme, no significant differences in responsiveness had been observed in groups A and B, whereas a statistically significant reduction of self-directed responses was noted, together with an increase of responses directed towards the other, after the Tomatis stimulation programme.

Dr Joan Neysmith-Roy (16) of the Department of Psychology of the University of Regina (Canada) recently completed a double-blind study with six children (boys) diagnosed as profoundly autistic. The study confirmed the clinical evidence that autistic children draw benefit from the Tomatis Method. At the end of the treatment, three (50%) of these children showed significant changes in behaviour. Of these, one was no longer considered autistic; the other two passed from a form of profound autism to a milder form of autism. The other three children showed no significant changes. Of particular interest was that five of the six children treated also showed a significant improvement in the behaviours of the pre-linguistic area, such as adaptability to change, the capacity for listening, non-verbal communication and the capacity for emotional response. Many families of autistic children have noticed that the Tomatis method leads to a better quality of life, thanks to the stimulation of the development of the prerequisites of learning, rendering them more able to benefit from the specialised programmes of socialisation and of education.

Dr Neysmith-Roy also wrote a doctoral thesis on the effects of the Tomatis method on dyslexic boys (11).

Other research has been conducted on stuttering (12), laterality (13,14), anxiety and depression (15), which show the positive effects obtained with the Tomatis method.

Research references

1. Gilmor, T.M. (1999), The Efficacy of the Tomatis method for Children with Learning and Communication Disorders, International Journal of Listening, 13, 12

2. Gilmor, T.M. (1982), A pre-test and post-test survey of children and adolescents' performance before and after completing the Tomatis Program. Research Report, MDS Inc., Toronto, Ontario.

3. Gilmor, T.M. (1984), A pre-test and post-test survey of children and adolescents' performance before and after completing the Tomatis Program. Final Report, MDS Inc., Toronto, Ontario.

4. Rourke, B.P. & Russel, D.L. (1982), The Tomatis Method applied to older learning disabled children: An evaluation. Paper presented at the Opening Communication Conference, Toronto, November 1982.

5. Wilson, Iavociello, Metlay, Risucci, Rosati & Palmaccio (1982) The Tomatis Project / Final Report, Department of neurology North Shore University Hospital and Hofstra University, Department of psychology. Paper presented at the Opening Communication Conference, Toronto, Ontario.

6. Kershner, J., Cummings, R., Clarke, K., Hadfield, A., & Kershner, B. (1986), Evaluation of the Tomatis Listening Training Program with learning disabled children. Canadian Journal of Special Education, 2, 1 - 32.

7. Kershner, J., Cummings R., Clarke, K., Hadfield, A. & Kershner, B. (1986). Two year evaluation of the Tomatis Listening Program with learning disabled children. Learning Disability Quarterly, 13, 43 - 53.

8. Mould, P. (1985), An evaluation of dyslexic boy's response to the Tomatis Listening Training Programme: Interim Report. Brickwall House, Northiam, East Sussex, England

9. Stutt, H.A. (1983), The Tomatis method: A review of current research. Montreal,Mc Gill University

10. De Bruto, C.M.E. (1983), Audio-psycho-phonology and the mentally retarded child: An empirical investigation Paper presented at the First Congress on Audio-Psycho-phonology, Potchefstroom

11. Roy, J. (1982), Cognitive control functioning and spontaneous speech: Intensive case studies of Audio-Psycho-Phonological remedial training with five dyslexic boys. Doctoral Dissertation, University of Ottawa.

12. Van Jaarsveld, 1973, 1974, quoted by Pieter E. van Jaarsveld and Wynand F. du Plessis, in S. Afr. Tydskr. Sielk. 1988, 18 (4)

13. Van Wyck (1974), idem

14. Badenhorst (1975), n'Rorschachstudie van regssydiges en linksluiteraars met gemengde laterale voorkeure. Ongepubliseerde M-graad-skripsie, Potchefstroom, Universiteit vir CHO, Potchefstroom

15. Du Plessis, (1982), Beangste en nie-beangste eerstejaardamestudente: Klinies-psigologiese verkenning . Ongepubliseerde doktorale proefskrif, Potchefstroom Universiteit vir CHO, Potchefstroom.

16. Roy, J. (2001), The Tomatis method with several autistic boys: individual case studies of behavioural changes, South African Journal of Psychology, n. 31, 1, 2001.