Event-Related Potentials Elicited by Phonetic Errors Differentiate Children With Speech Sound Disorder and Typically Developing Peers

Purpose A growing body of research suggests that a deficit in speech perception abilities contributes to the development of speech sound disorder (SSD). However, little work has been done to characterize the neurophysiological processes indexing speech perception deficits in this population. The primary aim of this study was to compare the neural activity underlying speech perception in young children with SSD and with typical development (TD). Method Twenty-eight children ages 4;1–6;0 (years;months) participated in this study. Event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded while children completed a speech perception task that included phonetic (speech sound) and lexical (meaning) matches and mismatches. Groups were compared on their judgment accuracy for matches and mismatches as well as the mean amplitude of the phonological mapping negativity (PMN) and N400 ERP components. Results Children with SSD demonstrated lower judgment accuracy across the phonetic and lexical conditions compared to peers with TD. The ERPs elicited by lexical matches and mismatches did not distinguish the groups. However, in the phonetic condition, the SSD group exhibited a more consistent left-lateralized PMN effect and a delayed N400 effect over frontal sites compared to the TD group. Conclusions These findings provide some of the first evidence of a delay in the neurophysiological processing of phonological information for young children with SSD compared to their peers with TD. This delay was not present for the processing of lexical information, indicating a unique difference between children with SSD and with TD related to speech perception of phonetic errors. Supplemental Material https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.16915579

The development of lexical semantics for Mandarin-speaking children in China: An exploratory study based on the East China Normal University Vocabulary Test

Through the compilation and research of the East China Normal University Vocabulary Test, this study explored the development of receptive and expressive language abilities of 58 children in the 2–3-year-old age group and 36 children in the 4–5-year-old age group. Results found that the children’s score of receptive vocabulary is higher than the score of expressive vocabulary, while there is a significant correlation between receptive vocabulary and expressive vocabulary. Moreover, children in the group of 2–3-year-olds had significantly lower scores than children in the group of 4–5-years-olds in both receptive and expressive vocabulary. Further analysis points out the earliest and most common word class of children is nouns, followed by verbs. Among the verbs, active verbs are the first to be acquired. Classifiers are the last acquired vocabulary by Chinese children. The exploration of phonetic errors reflects that children of 2–3 years old tend to misunderstand words by the similar sounds in words, but as their age increases, the number of phonetic errors decreases. Moreover, the results also indicate that biological and specific things are the two semantic categories learned by children. With cognition developing with age, the number of the words in different semantic categories that children acquired expands.

Phonetics teaching in terms of ethnic oriented education of "Russian as a foreign language" classes

The article raises the question of Russian language phonetics teaching in “Russian as a Foreign Language” (referred to as “RFL”) classes for an individual language student group. This study falls into the category of researches dedicated to the analysis of different approaches to ethnic oriented teaching of foreign languages. In particular, typical mistakes of Chinese students made at Russian phonetics lessons are analyzed. They exist not only due to the interference of two unrelated languages (Chinese and Russian), but also due to the features of various students’ Chinese dialects. The main analysis of the current research is the comparative method of unrelated languages analysis, which is set to describe features of phonological systems of Russian and Chinese languages, as well as to uncover typical articulation errors. This article defines the classification of typical pronunciation errors of all Chinese students, which is divided by the article’s authors into two types: interference and dialect errors. Authors come to the conclusion that ethnic oriented approach to the teaching of Russian language phonetics is quite productive, since it creates the possibility to analyze phonetic errors and problematic moments to the students who study foreign language by comparing them to the specific articulative and prosodic features of their native language. The framework of the current article and the given classification of typical errors can be quite helpful to the teachers of “RFL” classes in their pedagogic practices while preparing the classes with Chinese students, and it can attract the attention of expertise who are developing Russian phonetics courses and creating handbooks based on ethnic oriented approach.

Analysis and typology of phonetic errors in the vocal speech of Italian speaking students

The relevance of the undertaken research is explained by the fact that phonetic skills and the absence of the phenomenon of errors at this level are important when teaching Russian as a foreign language to Italian speaking students. Researchers M.N. Shutov and I.A. Orekhova paid attention to this importance in their in-depth studies and other scientists. The purpose of this re-search is to analyze and typology of the phenomenon of errors at the phonetic level of Italian speaking students when teaching Russian as a foreign language. We concluded that, in practice, a B1 level student in monologue and dialogical speech, faced with difficulty in placing stress in a word, tries to find an analogue in his native language in consciousness (uses pure interlingual in-terference at the phonetic level) or tries to stress a word (in Russian), taking into account familiar rules (depending on the level of proficiency in Russian as a foreign language).

Assessing the Role of Selective Fossilization Hypothesis in Determining Fossilizable Phonetic Errors in Tunisian EFL Learners’ Oral Output

Fossilization is said to be a distinctive characteristic of second language (L2) learning (Selinker, 1972, 1996; Han, 2004). It is the most pervasive among adult L2 learners (Han and Odlin, 2006). This linguistic phenomenon has been characterized by cessation of learning, even though the learner is exposed to frequent input. Based on the findings of the MA dissertation of the first researcher which is about ‘phonetic fossilization’ and where she conducted a longitudinal study, Han’s Selective Fossilization Hypothesis (SFL) is used to analyze the obtained fossilized phonetic errors in relation to L1 markedness and L2 robustness with a particular focus on fossilized vowel sounds. This is an analytical model for identifying both acquisitional and fossilizable linguistic features based on learners’ first language (L1) markedness and second language (L2) robustness. The article first gives an overview of the theory of Interlanguage and the phenomenon of fossilization. Then, it introduces SFL. This is an attempt to study fossilization scientifically. In other words, it tests the predictive power of a developed L1 Markedness and L2 Robustness rating scale based on Han’s (2009) model. The present study has pedagogic implications; it is an opportunity to raise teachers’ awareness on this common linguistic phenomenon.

Musykilât Ta’lîm al-Ashwâth al-‘Arabiyyah li Ghair al-Nâthiqîn bihâ wa Tharîqah Hillihâ fî Ta’lîmihâ

This paper aims to describe the problems in learning phonology, various phonetic problems, the cause of their occurrence and how to overcome them. This paper is a qualitative descriptive study with the type of literature review from which the results of scientific research or other books are closely related to the learning of phonology knowledge, problems and ways to overcome them which are then explained descriptively. The results of this paper conclude that: 1) learning phonology in Arabic is very important to teach at the beginning of the teaching of Arabic because errors in saying a word affect the true or meaningless; 2) There are two main problems in general teaching phonology for non-Arab students, namely: problems relating to the direction of education and problems related to linguistic systems that include phonetic errors and pronunciation of a letter and word; 3) The cause of the problem is because it is influenced by the use of mother tongue (first language) in general, so that it cannot distinguish the length or short of a tone, the pronouncement of self-determination letters, pronunciation of syamsiyah and qamariyah letters, pronunciation of letters of the same nature and pronunciation tanwin letters; 4) As for the solutions offered in overcoming the phoneme pronunciation problem are: proactively instructors should develop children's fluency in speaking phonemes, indoctrinate sound sounds in listening and speaking activities, obtain language sounds in reading and writing activities, and design teaching processes through practical training in tongue sports to gain phoneme skills.