title: Toddlers' processing of phonological alternations: early compensation for assimilation in English and French.
abstract: Using a picture pointing task, this study examines toddlers' processing of phonological alternations that trigger sound changes in connected speech. Three experiments investigate whether 2;5- to 3-year-old children take into account assimilations--processes by which phonological features of one sound spread to adjacent sounds--for the purpose of word recognition (e.g., in English, ten pounds can be produced as te[mp]ounds). English toddlers (n = 18) show sensitivity to native place assimilations during lexical access in Experiment 1. Likewise, French toddlers (n = 27) compensate for French voicing assimilations in Experiment 2. However, French toddlers (n = 27) do not take into account a hypothetical non-native place assimilation rule in Experiment 3, suggesting that compensation for assimilation is already language specific.
authors.affiliation: University of Essex. kskor@essex.ac.uk
authors.forename: Katrin
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Skoruppa
authors.forename: Nivedita
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Mani
authors.forename: Sharon
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Peperkamp
mesh_terms: D002675:Child, Preschool; D004739:England; D005260:Female; D005602:France; D006801:Humans; D007804:Language Development; D008297:Male; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D010700:Phonetics; D012660:Semantics; D013067:Speech Perception / Q000502:physiology*