Preschool speech error patterns predict articulation and phonological awareness outcomes in children with histories of speech sound disorders.

PURPOSE: To determine if speech error patterns in preschoolers with speech sound disorders (SSDs) predict articulation and phonological awareness (PA) outcomes almost 4 years later. METHOD: Twenty-five children with histories of preschool SSDs (and normal receptive language) were tested at an average age of 4;6 (years;months) and were followed up at age 8;3. The frequency of occurrence of preschool distortion errors, typical substitution and syllable structure errors, and atypical substitution and syllable structure errors was used to predict later speech sound production, PA, and literacy outcomes. RESULTS: Group averages revealed below-average school-age articulation scores and low-average PA but age-appropriate reading and spelling. Preschool speech error patterns were related to school-age outcomes. Children for whom >10% of their speech sound errors were atypical had lower PA and literacy scores at school age than children who produced <10% atypical errors. Preschoolers who produced more distortion errors were likely to have lower school-age articulation scores than preschoolers who produced fewer distortion errors. CONCLUSION: Different preschool speech error patterns predict different school-age clinical outcomes. Many atypical speech sound errors in preschoolers may be indicative of weak phonological representations, leading to long-term PA weaknesses. Preschoolers' distortions may be resistant to change over time, leading to persisting speech sound production problems.

Developing a weighted measure of speech sound accuracy.

PURPOSE: To develop a system for numerically quantifying a speaker's phonetic accuracy through transcription-based measures. With a focus on normal and disordered speech in children, the authors describe a system for differentially weighting speech sound errors on the basis of various levels of phonetic accuracy using a Weighted Speech Sound Accuracy (WSSA) score. The authors then evaluate the reliability and validity of this measure. METHOD: Phonetic transcriptions were analyzed from several samples of child speech, including preschoolers and young adolescents with and without speech sound disorders and typically developing toddlers. The new measure of phonetic accuracy was validated against existing measures, was used to discriminate typical and disordered speech production, and was evaluated to examine sensitivity to changes in phonetic accuracy over time. Reliability between transcribers and consistency of scores among different word sets and testing points are compared. RESULTS: Initial psychometric data indicate that WSSA scores correlate with other measures of phonetic accuracy as well as listeners' judgments of the severity of a child's speech disorder. The measure separates children with and without speech sound disorders and captures growth in phonetic accuracy in toddlers' speech over time. The measure correlates highly across transcribers, word lists, and testing points. CONCLUSION: Results provide preliminary support for the WSSA as a valid and reliable measure of phonetic accuracy in children's speech.

Phonological awareness and types of sound errors in preschoolers with speech sound disorders.

PURPOSE: Some children with speech sound disorders (SSD) have difficulty with literacy-related skills, particularly phonological awareness (PA). This study investigates the PA skills of preschoolers with SSD by using a regression model to evaluate the degree to which PA can be concurrently predicted by types of speech sound errors. METHOD: Preschoolers with SSD (n = 43) participated in PA and speech sound production assessment. Errors from a 125-item picture naming task were coded in 2 ways: (a) considering all consonant errors equally (percentage of consonants correct [PCC]) and (b) using a 3-category system that captures component features of sound errors (typical sound changes, atypical sound changes, and distortions). PA tasks included rhyme matching, onset matching, onset segmentation and matching, and blending. RESULTS: Variance in a PA composite score could be predicted partly by vocabulary and age (33%). Atypical sound changes accounted for an additional 6% of variance in PA, but distortions and typical errors did not account for significant variance. When the same consonant errors were analyzed using PCC, speech errors did not predict significant variance in PA. CONCLUSIONS: Poorer PA is associated with lower receptive vocabularies and more atypical sound errors. Results are interpreted in the context of the accuracy of phonological representations.

Speed and accuracy of rapid speech output by adolescents with residual speech sound errors including rhotics.

Children with residual speech sound errors are often underserved clinically, yet there has been a lack of recent research elucidating the specific deficits in this population. Adolescents aged 10-14 with residual speech sound errors (RE) that included rhotics were compared to normally speaking peers on tasks assessing speed and accuracy of speech production. The two groups were evaluated on an oral diadochokinetic task, which required rapid production of the trisyllable /p Lambda t Lambda k Lambda/, and two rapid naming tasks: monosyllabic letter names and multisyllabic picture names. No significant group differences were observed in the speed of trisyllables on the DDK task, whether examining all attempts or only correct productions. However, the RE group was less accurate and more variable in their production of the trisyllables. In addition, the RE group was slower and phonologically less accurate in rapidly naming multisyllabic pictures, but not in naming letters. A combination of speed and accuracy measures from these tasks revealed relatively little overlap between groups. Results suggest that both speed and accuracy may be impaired in adolescents with RE, although the underlying causal mechanisms require further exploration.

Phonological processing skills of adolescents with residual speech sound errors.

PURPOSE: Research has shown that young children with speech sound disorders may have weaknesses in phonological processing. However, such skills have not been thoroughly examined in adolescents with residual speech sound errors. Therefore, this study compared the phonological processing abilities of adolescents with residual speech sound errors to those of normally speaking peers. METHOD: Two nonword repetition tasks, multisyllabic word repetition, spoonerisms, phoneme reversals, and an elision task were used to compare the phonological processing skills of 10-14-year-olds with residual speech sound errors that include rhotic phonemes (RE, n = 13) to those of normally speaking (NS, n = 14) adolescents of similar age and receptive vocabulary abilities. RESULTS: The 2 groups were found to differ on 5 of the 6 phonological processing tasks. Discriminant analysis showed that 85% of the participants could be correctly classified into the RE and NS groups based solely on phonological processing skills. CONCLUSION: The possible nature of the phonological processing impairment is discussed in the context of current theoretical understanding. It is recommended that when planning assessment and intervention for adolescents with residual speech sound errors, clinicians be cognizant of the fact that the adolescents may also have weaknesses in phonological processing.