Effect of Neighborhood Density on Speech Sound Acquisition in Typically Developing Malayalam Speaking Children Aged 1-3years

Abstract

Speech sound production is an important aspect of the children’s language. Children produce words by combining speech sounds with contrasting distinctive features. Acquisition of speech sound combinations in typically developing children is limited in the field of child phonology. The present study aimed to analyze and compare the acquisition pattern of selected target sounds and their neighboring speech sounds in Malayalam speaking typically developing children between 1 to 3 years of age with respect to: (a) Place of articulation (b) Manner of articulation. Twenty typically developing children participated in the study. They were categorized into four age groups with five children in each age group. The spontaneous or elicited speech samples of the children were audio video-recorded during unstructured free play interaction. The speech sample was phonetically transcribed in IPA by two of the investigators. All the speech sounds of Malayalam language that emerged in participants were chosen as target sounds and speech sounds occurring in their neighborhood were transcribed and analyzed for frequency of occurrence and pattern of distribution (density). Various neighborhood density and patterns were evident in the age groups studied. The neighborhood pattern in different age groups paralleled the speech sound acquisition. The results are discussed in the backdrop of acquisition of speech motor control in the spatial and temporal dimensions in the emerging articulatory control. The trend observed suggests that transcription based procedure for identifying the emerging speech sound profile of a child in terms of its neighborhood could be used as a simple, yet potential clinical tool in commenting on the maturing articulatory mechanism