PURPOSE: to quantify the occurrence of primary tongue movements in 130 children with oronasal breathing and in 89 with nasal breathing with ages between 5 and 12 years old, evaluated in the Section of Mouth Breathing, of the Clinical Hospital of Unicamp, within the Otorrinolaringology Clinic. METHODS: during the evaluation, the children were requested to swallow saliva, close their eyes and put their tongue outside the mouth. They were supposed to stay like this for, at least, one minute, which is enough time to monitor their primary movements. Two language speech pathologists monitored each child, in order to verify the presence of movements. RESULTS: the occurrence of the primary tongue movements was found in 44.75% of the sample (n=98), while 55.25% (n=121) did not show any such movements. It was observed that both nasal and oronasal categories showed statistically significant difference as for the occurrences of primary tongue movements. CONCLUSION: oronasal breathing has higher frequency for maintenance of primary tongue movements, and there is statistically significant difference between oronasal and nasal breathing groups as for the primary tongue movement's variable.
Mouth Breathing; Child; Tongue; Muscle Strength; Deglutition
