Standardised tests of whole-word accuracy are popular in the speech pathology and developmental psychology literature as measures of children's speech performance. However, they may not be sensitive enough to measure changes in speech output in children with severe and persisting speech difficulties (SPSD). To identify the best ways of doing this,…

The current investigation examined the development of voice onset time (VOT) in Standard-Greek (SG) and Cypriot-Greek (CG)-speaking children at age levels 2;0-2;5, 2;6-2;11, 3;0-3;5, and 3;6-4;0 years. SG presents with a two-way voicing contrast (voiced and voiceless unaspirated stops) whereas CG is a three-way contrast dialect containing…

Speakers are faster and more accurate at processing certain sound sequences within their language. Does this reflect the fact that these sequences are frequent or that they are phonetically less complex (e.g., easier to articulate)? It has been difficult to contrast these two factors given their high correlation in natural languages. In this…

Children's early word productions often differ from the target form, sometimes exhibiting vowel lengthening when word-final coda consonants are omitted (e.g., "dog" /d[open o]g/ [arrow right] [d[open o]:]). It has typically been assumed that such lengthening compensates for a missing prosodic unit (a mora). However, this study raises the…

Background: The non-word repetition task (NRT) has gained wide acceptance in describing language acquisition in both children with normal language development (NL) and children with specific language impairments (SLI). This task has gained wide acceptance because it so closely matches the phonological component of word learning, and correlates…

When English-speaking two-year-olds begin producing polysyllabic words, they often omit unstressed syllables that precede syllables with primary stress (Allen & Hawkins, 1980; Klein, 1981; Gerken, 1994a). One proposed mechanism for these omissions is that children omit syllables at a phonological level, due to prosodic constraints that act on…

Vocalizations of two female infants, recorded over a five-week period after the first emergence of cooing were studied. It was found that the features of the more primitive sound types regrouped themselves in comfort sounds. The implications for theories of prespeech development are discussed. (EJS)

A detailed analysis of a six-month period in a child's acquisition of phonetic and phonological capacities indicates that the apparent plateau of the second year is a site of intensive language learning, which is not reflected in the growth of vocabulary or mean length of utterance. (Author/EJS)

Analysis of a complete set of word-forms produced by a one-year-old at the one-word stage found that the data showed little phonetic variability and that phonological development during the period studied (about one year) was qualitatively continuous with subsequent development. (Author/CB)

Purpose: Little is known about the phonological aspects of derivational processes. Neutral suffixes (e.g., "-ness") that do not change stress and rhythmic or nonneutral suffixes (e.g., "-ity") that alter stem stress were used in a production task that explored developmental changes in phonological accuracy of derived English…

Using Locke's 1983 model, analyzes one tendency, consonant use in babbling and early words, and phonological word-selection patterns in 10 children, aged 8 to 16 months. Individual differences were found in all three domains analyzed, with some increase in uniformity across subjects with increasing knowledge of language. (Author/SED)

Presents a linguistic analysis of malaproprisms produced by children. (MM)