Background: Verbal fluency tests (VFT) are highly sensitive to cognitive deficits. Usually, the score on VFT is based on the number of correct words produced, yet it alone gives little information regarding underlying test performance. The implementation of different strategies (cluster and switching) to perform efficiently during the tasks…

Children are known to be fast learners due to their neural plasticity. Learning a non-native language (L2) requires the mastering of new production patterns. In classroom settings, learners are not only exposed to the acoustic input, but also to the unfamiliar grapheme-phoneme correspondences of the L2 orthography. We tested how 9-10-year-old…

Background: Learning to read is a complex process that involves phonological and orthographic processing abilities, broader language skills and cognitive processes across all writing systems. Although these components remain common, the pace of acquisition of phonological and orthographic processing and reading abilities differ across writing…

Infants undergo fundamental shifts in perception that are reported to be critical for language acquisition. In particular, infants' perception of native and non-native sounds begins to align with the properties of their native sound system. Thus far, empirical evidence for this transition--perceptual narrowing--has drawn from socio-economically…

Objective: Currently, no clinically feasible objective measures exist that are specific to the signs of adductor laryngeal dystonia (LD), deterring effective diagnosis and treatment. This project sought to establish concurrent validity of a new automated acoustic outcome measure, designed to be specific to adductor laryngeal dystonia (AdLD): the…

Non-native phoneme perception can be challenging for adult learners. This article explores two routes to strengthening early representations of non-native targets: perceptual training, which focuses on auditory discrimination of novel contrasts, and articulatory training, which highlights the articulatory gestures of non-native categories. Of…

This study investigated the effect of preschool-wide, teacher-implemented, phoneme-focused phonological awareness (PA) and letter-sound knowledge (LSK) instruction, on raising code-based school-entry reading readiness for children with Spoken Language Difficulties (SLD) and Typical Development (TD), when supported by weekly coaching by trainee…

The aim of the present study was to examine the hypothesis that, compared to typically reading children matched on regular word reading, adults with basic literacy (either adult literacy students or adult basic education students) struggle on phonologically demanding tasks but are relatively performant on orthographic demanding tasks, and hence…

Featural approaches to second language phonetic acquisition posit that the development of new phonetic norms relies on sub-phonemic features, expressed through a constellation of articulatory gestures and their corresponding acoustic cues, which may be shared across multiple phonemes. Within featural approaches, largely supported by research in…

The paper presents the results of a complex study of ?onsonantal phonemes' syntagmatics, registered at the beginning, in the middle and at the end of the word throughout the historical development of the English language. The analysis of frequencies of consonantal clusters' actualization allowed the author to characterize the regularities of their…

The aim of this study was to understand the relationship between children's knowledge of letter-sound rules ("grapheme-phoneme knowledge") and their ability to identify separate graphemes (e.g., SH, OI) that comprise words ("grapheme parsing"). We used a single-case study approach with children with phonological dyslexia who…

We examined whether global instruction of complex akshara and explicit phoneme-level instruction of akshara impact the development of phoneme awareness and its association with akshara knowledge and word reading accuracy. The participants were 100 Sinhala-speaking children from Grades 4 and 5 in Sri Lanka. Phoneme awareness showed stronger growth…

Previous research on pronunciation errors observed that the most frequently mispronounced English phonemes are word-initial consonants. The findings of the current study invalidate those observations by presenting the data analysis of 40 Turkish EFL learners' speech samples, which illustrates that segmental speech errors are position-independent…

This study investigated how at-risk kindergarten students respond to the identification of letters and sounds using an embedded picture mnemonic intervention. The problem addressed was that kindergarten students face challenges in developing letter-name knowledge, letter-sound knowledge, and their reciprocal relationship (i.e., grapheme-phoneme…

Purpose: Children progress from making grapheme-phoneme connections to making grapho-syllabic connections before whole-word connections during reading development (Ehri, 2005a). More is known about the development of grapheme--phoneme connections than is known about grapho-syllabic connections. Therefore, we explored the trajectory of syllable use…