1. The acquisition of morphophonology
The role of phonology and vocabulary in TD children and children with developmental dyslexia
Handout
Tiffany Boersma, Judith Rispens, Anne Baker, Fred Weerman
ACLC, University of Amsterdam
Introduction
Results
Logistic generalized mixed effects model with binary data
What factors influence the acquisition of morphophonemic alternations?
Phonological processing skills?
Phonological composition of the verb stem influences past tense accuracy in English speaking TD children (Oetting & Horohov, 1997; Blom et al., 2012)
Allomorph type plays a role in diminutive acquisition (Den Os & Harder, 1987; Peelaerts, 2012)
Vocabulary size?
Vocabulary development is a strong predictor of morphological and syntactic development (Marchman et al., 2004; Blom & Paradis, 2013; Kidd & Kirjavainen, 2011)
Reading problems?
Morphological processing deficits in children with developmental dyslexia are a consequence of their phonological processing deficits (Robertson et al. 2012)
Does having developmental dyslexia influence the acquisition of morphophonemic alternations?
TD or dyslexia did not predict production accuracies
PPVT (trend) Z = 1.699, p = .0893
Past tense existing & novel:
TD: Five year olds significantly lower than other ages
Past tense pseudo:
Variation between children considerable
No significant predictors
Differences TD and dyslexia only between 5;0 -5;11 year olds and children with dyslexia
Significant predictors diminutive marking
Diminutive existing:
Phonological awareness Z = 2.261, p = .0238
TD: Progression with age
No differences TD and dyslexia
PPVT Z = 2.463, p = .0138
Diminutive novel:
TD: Only progression in 8 year olds
Nonword repetition Z = 2.499, p = .0125
More variation children with dyslexia on diminutive novel nouns
Digit span (trend) Z = , p = .0681
Significant predictors past tense marking
Past tense existing:
Phonological awareness Z = 2.342, p = .0192
Methods
Children
Age
Mean age (SD) N TD
5;0 – 5;11
(.479) 42
6;0 – 6;11
(.669) 25
7;0 – 7;11
(.800) 23
8;0 – 9;0
(1.214) 14
Dyslexia
8;0 – 10;0
(7.15) 19
Difference TD or dyslexia?
Past tense production NO
Diminutive production NO
Experimental task
Elicited past tense and diminutive
Existing verbs (N=20)/nouns (N=40)
Novel verbs (N=20)/nouns (N=40)
Stimuli tested in two sets
Standardised tasks
Tested phonological processing skills
Phonological awareness (CELF-IV)
Digit span (CELF-IV)
Nonword repetition (Rispens & Baker, 2012)
Tested vocabulary skills
PPVT
Past tense
Phonological processing skills significant effect?
YES existing NO novel
Vocabulary size significant effect?
Trend existing NO novel * *
Diminutive
Phonological processing skills significant effect?
YES existing YES novel
Vocabulary size significant effect? YES existing NO novel
Stimuli
Dutch Past tense
/də/: After stems ending in a voiced consonant or vowel
Ren-de (to run)
Aai-de (to pet)
/tə/: After stems ending in a voiceless consonant
Bak-te (to bake)
Knip-te (to cut)
Dutch Diminutive
Suffixes on nouns: /jə/, /tjə/, /pjə/, /kjə/, /ətjə/
Phonological constraints:
Final consonant phonology determines allomorph
Boon-tje (bean), huis-je (house), Koning-kje (king)
Number of syllables
Koning-kje (king), ring-etje (ring)
Length of the vowel
Boom-pje (tree), bom-etje (bomb) * *
Discussion/conclusion
Phonological skills and vocabulary size important
Large amount of variation
But other factors need to be investigated
past tense
Input?
Reasons for no difference between TD and dyslexia
diminutive
Age difference?
Some allomorphs produced less accurately than others
Compensation?
Next steps: Allomorph analysis
Type frequency allomorphs
Phonotactic frequency stem + allomorph
Phonological composition of the stem
Statement regarding Conflict of Interest
The authors, Tiffany Boersma, Judith Rispens, Anne Baker and Fred Weerman, declare to not have any conflict of interest regarding this research.
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2. References
Blom, E., & Paradis, J. (2013). Past tense by english second language learners with and witout language impairment. Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences, 56,
Blom, E., Paradis, J., & Duncan, T. S. (2012). Effects of input properties, vocabulary size, and L1 on the development of third person singular -s in child L2 english. Language Learning, 62(3), doi: /j x
Den Os, E., & Harder, R. (1987). De verwerving van de regels voor meervouds- en verkleinwoordsvorming in het nederlands. De Nieuwe Taalgids, 80,
Kidd, E., & Kirjavainen, M. (2011). Investigating the conribution of procedural and declarative memory to the acquisition of past tense morphology: Evidence from finnish. Language and Cognitive Processes, 26(4/5/6), doi: /
Marchman, V. A., Saccuman, C., & Wulfeck, B. (2004). Productive use of the english past tense in children with focal brain injury and specific language impairment. Brain & Language, 88,
Oetting, J. B., & Horovoh, J. E. (1997). Past-tense marking by children with and without specific language impairment. Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research, 40,
Peelaerts, C. (2008). Van kleine boot tot scheepje: Experimenteel onderzoek naar de diminutiefvorming bij vlaamse kinderen. Unpublished manuscript.
Robertson, E. K., Joanisse, M. F., Desroches, A. S., & Terry, A. (2012). Past-tense morphology and phonological deficits in children with dyslexia and children with language impairment. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 20(10), 1-11.