dc.description.abstract | Typical phonological error patterns observed on the word, syllable, and phoneme level in
children’s language production are sensitive to and vary across (supra)segmental contexts. A
valid procedure for investigating the effect of different contexts on errors is the non-word
repetition task with varied phonological structures. Continuing on our previous findings
(Popović et al., 2017), which show a significant effect of non-word length on total repetition
accuracy, the aim of this study was to examine this effect on specific types of errors in
repetitions.
The study included 75 monolingual typically developing (TD) Serbian children, aged 3 to 7.
The used non-word repetition task consisted of 48 non-words constructed by systematically
varying the number of syllables (two, three, and four), and three other phonological parameters:
the position of syllable stress, onset and coda. The children’s task was to repeat each prerecorded non-word after hearing it. The repetitions were audio recorded, transcribed, and coded
for 16 types of errors on the word, syllable and phoneme level.
Two-way factorial ANOVAs, with factors age and number of syllables (N Syll.), were
performed for the six most frequent errors in the repetitions. The following significant effects
and interactions are shown for the different errors: Stress shifting: age (F(4, 70) = 8.124,
p < .001), N Syll. (F(2, 140) = 118.5, p < .001), interaction (F(8, 140) = 2.576, p = .012); Onset
consonant cluster reduction: age (F(4, 70) = 13.35, p < .001), N Syll. (F(2, 140) = 26.92,
p < .001); Coda consonant omission: age (F(4, 70) = 8.645, p < .001), N Syll. (F(2, 140) =
15.84, p < .001); Coda consonant addition: age (F(4, 70) = 7.474, p < .001), N Syll.
(F(2, 140) = 16.89, p < .001), interaction (F(8, 140) = 3.34, p = .002); Consonant metathesis:
age (F(4, 70) = 11.01, p < .001), N Syll. (F(2, 140) = 86.05, p < .001), interaction
F(8, 140) = 5.650, p < .001); Phoneme substitution: age (F(4, 70) = 30.97, p < .001), N Syll.
(F(2, 140) = 130.5, p < .001), interaction (F(8, 140) = 2.41, p = .018).
It may be concluded that with increasing non-word length, the repetition accuracy at all three
levels (word, syllable, and phoneme) decreases in Serbian TD children, especially at younger
ages. Three-year-olds have mastered some parameters of the shortest non-words, but make a
large number of all errors on the longer ones. With age, children master word length, and at the
age of 7 they make minimal errors, except for phoneme substitutions and stress shifting on the
longest four-syllable non-words. | sr |