This study constitutes the beginning of a longitudinal investigation of phonological development of four children from birth to 2 years. Little variation was found in mean fundamental frequency. Duration, within-utterance range and variability did show developmental change. (RM)

This article reports on a study to determine the role of intonation in language acquisition. Related studies are mentioned. Research methods for the study are outlined and two case studies are reviewed. Conclusions show that adult-child interaction influences not only the child's use of intonation but also his acquisition of syntax. (Text is in…

Data on the acquisition of lexical tone were collected from 17 Mandarin-speaking children. Among other results, it was found that: (1) tone is acquired relatively quickly; (2) mastery of tones occurs well before mastery of segmentals; and (3) Mandarin high-level and falling tones are acquired before rising and dipping tones. (Author/RM)

The phonotactic development of one child is traced from age 3;9 to 5;3. Data are presented in a table indicating both the child's phonological equivalent of adult consonant sequences and the range distinguished by the child at a given stage. (CHK)

A study of the utterances of young children, aged 7 to 22 months, is described. These utterances, varying in length from one to 17 syllables, contain only suprasegmental information because the verbal content was incomprehensible to hearers who were not acquainted with the child and the situation in which the utterances occured. In the corpus,…

This paper represents a partial condensation of the results of a study covering 14 months in a Russian-speaking child's phonological development. Evidence supports a theory of phonological acquisition formulated by Olmsted (1971), and offers detailed information on the child's acquisition of specific phones. (CHK)

Many researchers have assumed that adult bilinguals have separate systems for their two languages. Such an assumption raises interesting questions about how the two languages are acquired in the case of a child learning two languages simultaneously. This study attempts to determine whether the two languages are acquired separately right from the…

Data on the development of fundamental frequency patterns and the emergence of semantic relations during the "one word period" in child language development are reported in this study. The research focuses on the changes that occur as children progress from producing single words to sequences of single words and finally to producing…

Selected aspects of early phonological development are described, and eight important characteristics are suggested. It is held that the child plays a highly active, creative role in the acquisition process. The child's early vocables constitute a connecting link between babbling and adult-modeled speech; the child's phonological systems for…

Fricatives and affricates in different word positions and initial fricative clusters were elicited from three linguistically deviant children (ages five years, two months to seven years) and one normal child (age two years, nine months) by means of pictures depicting familiar objects. Data from two of the older children and the normal child are…

A study of the babbling and phonological development of 54 infants used half-hour videotape recordings of the children at play in their own homes. The vocal output was phonetically transcribed twice for interrater agreement, and analyzed for the consonants used five times or more in the child's vocal repertoire. These consonants were considered to…

This study discusses the nature of rhythm as it may apply to speech and language, reviews some of the literature on the development of rhythm, and presents some thoughts relating these findings to specific examples of children's speech. There is evidence to support the view that one need not look at the exact rhythm of any utterance, but only for…

The first part of this bibliography contains annotations of articles on the acquisition of voice onset time (VOT) as the marker of a phonological contrast, that is, the studies concern children who are already developing a phonological system. The most common questions are the following: (1) When children begin to produce initial stops, how are…

The research reported here was carried out to help establish the normal course of fricative acquisition as a basis for comparisons with abnormal development. Three questions concerning phonological processes were investigated as part of a larger study of fricative acquisition: (1) the phonological processes that underlie children's fricative…

This paper reports on a longitudinal study of the acquisition of the voicing contrast in English word-initial stop consonants, as measured by voice onset time. Four monolingual children were recorded at two week intervals, beginning when the children were about 1;6. Data provided evidence for three general stages: (1) the child has no contrast;…