Children's Consonant Acquisition in 27 Languages: A Cross-Linguistic Review

The aim of this study was to provide a cross-linguistic review of acquisition of consonant phonemes to inform speech-language pathologists' expectations of children's developmental capacity by (a) identifying characteristics of studies of consonant acquisition, (b) describing general princ...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:American journal of speech-language pathology Vol. 27; no. 4; pp. 1546 - 1571
Main Authors: McLeod, Sharynne, Crowe, Kathryn
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: United States American Speech-Language-Hearing Association 01.11.2018
Subjects:
Acquired
Acquisition
Affricates
Afrikaans language
Arabic language
Cantonese
Case studies
Child development
Child welfare
Children
Clicks
Consonants
Creole languages
Creoles
Danish language
Dutch language
English language
Flaps
French language
Fricatives
German language
Germanic languages
Greek language
Haitian Creole
Hebrew language
Hungarian
Hungarian language
Icelandic language
Language acquisition
Language Universals
Languages
Linguistics
Mandarin
Multilingualism
Native language acquisition
Oral Language
Otology
Pediatric research
Phonemes
Phonetics
Phonology
Portuguese language
Researchers
Spanish language
Speaking
Speech
Speech disorders
Speech Language Pathology
Speech therapists
Suprasegmentals
Swahili language
Tswana language
Vowels
Word production
ISSN:1058-0360, 1558-9110, 1558-9110
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:The aim of this study was to provide a cross-linguistic review of acquisition of consonant phonemes to inform speech-language pathologists' expectations of children's developmental capacity by (a) identifying characteristics of studies of consonant acquisition, (b) describing general principles of consonant acquisition, and (c) providing case studies for English, Japanese, Korean, and Spanish. A cross-linguistic review was undertaken of 60 articles describing 64 studies of consonant acquisition by 26,007 children from 31 countries in 27 languages: Afrikaans, Arabic, Cantonese, Danish, Dutch, English, French, German, Greek, Haitian Creole, Hebrew, Hungarian, Icelandic, Italian, Jamaican Creole, Japanese, Korean, Malay, Maltese, Mandarin (Putonghua), Portuguese, Setswana (Tswana), Slovenian, Spanish, Swahili, Turkish, and Xhosa. Most studies were cross-sectional and examined single word production. Combining data from 27 languages, most of the world's consonants were acquired by 5;0 years;months old. By 5;0, children produced at least 93% of consonants correctly. Plosives, nasals, and nonpulmonic consonants (e.g., clicks) were acquired earlier than trills, flaps, fricatives, and affricates. Most labial, pharyngeal, and posterior lingual consonants were acquired earlier than consonants with anterior tongue placement. However, there was an interaction between place and manner where plosives and nasals produced with anterior tongue placement were acquired earlier than anterior trills, fricatives, and affricates. Children across the world acquire consonants at a young age. Five-year-old children have acquired most consonants within their ambient language; however, individual variability should be considered. https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.6972857.
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ISSN:1058-0360
1558-9110
1558-9110
DOI:10.1044/2018_AJSLP-17-0100