What are the vocal experiences of children growing up on Malakula island, Vanuatu, where multilingualism is the norm? Long-form audio-recordings captured spontaneous speech behavior by, and around, 38 children (5-33 months, 23 girls) from 11 villages. Automated analyses revealed most children's vocal input came from female adults and other…

We studied the gestures used by children with classic Rett syndrome (RTT) to provide evidence as to how this essential aspect of communicative functions develops. Seven participants with RTT were longitudinally observed between 9 and 18 months of life. The gestures used by these participants were transcribed and coded from a retrospective analysis…

An infant girl's unusual phonological behavior was evaluated in light of a maternal model which appeared to exaggerate features of normal conversational speech. Parental responses to immature speech patterns may account for selected case study behaviors which have been reported in both the child phonology and child fluency literatures. (KM)

Native speakers recorded utterances in three role-play contexts: speech to presyllabic infants, foreign language instruction, and adult conversation. For babytalk, speakers neglected, reduced, or modified lexical tonal information in favor of simplified and clarified intonation contours. The implications regarding tone acquisition in children and…