Child Language Acquisition

Phonological Development

Phonological development …

• This lecture deals with how children develop the ability to use and understand the sounds of language.

The first year …

• The phonological development that occurs during the first year of a child’s life was outlined last week:

Crying Cooing Babbling Phonemic expansion and

contraction

Be careful …

• Be careful not to make sweeping generalisations when talking about later phonological development.

• Order in which vowels and consonants are acquired varies from child to child.

• Sometimes children appear to have mastered a sound in one word, but then not in another.

General trends …

• Age 2 ½ : all vowels and 2/3 of consonants mastered.

• Age 4: difficulty with only a few consonants.

• Age 6-7: confident use.

General trends …

• Consonants are first used correctly at the beginnings of words.

• Consonants at the end of words present more difficulty.

• Example: ‘push’ versus ‘rip’

General trends …

• Frequency: generally, sounds which occur frequently in a large number of words will be acquired before sounds that occur less frequently.

Making words easier (phonemic simplification) …

• Deletion• Final consonants

may be dropped.• Unstressed syllables

are often deleted.• Consonant clusters

are reduced.

Making words easier (phonemic simplification) …

• Substitution• Easier sounds are

substituted for harder ones:

• ‘r’ becomes ‘w’• ‘th’ becomes ‘d’, ‘n’

or ‘f’• ‘t’ becomes ‘d’• ‘p’ becomes ‘b’

Understanding …

• Remember: last week we learned that comprehension is often ahead of speech (e.g. first words).

• The same can be true in phonological development.

Berko and Brown (1960) …

• Child: fis

• Adult: This if your fis?

• Child: No-my fis.

• Adult: Oh, this is your fish.

• Child: Yes, my fis.

Berko and Brown (1960) …

• Child with indistinguishable pronunciation of:

mouse/mouthcart/cardjug/duck

• Could point to corresponding pictures in a comprehension task.

Intonation …

• As a child grows older, a wider range of meanings is expressed through intonation.

• Example: two-word stage:

• ‘my car’ versus ‘MY car’

Intonation …

• Although intonation patterns can be reproduced from an early stage, understanding of their meaning is still developing into the teenage years.

Cruttenden (1974) …

• Football results.

• Intonation used in first team’s score enabled adults to accurately predict home win, away win or draw.

• Children (aged 7-11): youngest were largely unsuccessful and oldest were significantly less successful than adults.

New vocabulary …

• Phonemic simplification

• Deletion

• Substitution