Substitution patterns in the phonology of Spanish-speaking children

The purpose of this study was to examine the nature of substitution errors in typically developing Spanish-speaking children and those with phonological disorders. Previous research with English-speaking children has indicated that the frequency and types of substitution errors are two types of information that speech-language pathologists can use to differentially diagnose phonological disorders. In addition, previous studies with Italian speakers [Bortolini, U., & Leonard, L. (). The speech of phonologically disordered children acquiring Italian. Clinical Linguisitcs & Phonetics, 5, 1 – 12.] and Portuguese speakers [Yavaş, M., & Lamprecht, R. (). Processes and intelligibility in disordered phonology. Clinical Linguistics and Phonetics, 2, 329 – 345.] have indicated that substitution errors differ based on ambient language. No study has examined this phenomenon in Spanish-speaking children. In the current study, frequency and types of substitution errors in 39 typically developing children were compared to those in 39 age-matched children with phonological disorders. For both singletons and consonant clusters, typically developing children utilized a smaller number of substitutes per target, used a single substitute for a smaller number of targets, and exhibited dissimilar substitution patterns compared to their peers with phonological disorders. Some specific substitutions types were different than those reported for English-speaking children, indicating a language-specific pattern. These results have implications for the identification of Spanish-speaking children with phonological disorders and the cross-linguistic and language-specific nature of substitution errors.