Babbling Development of Hearing-Impaired and Normally Hearing Subjects

Abstract

Phonetic transcriptions of babbling samples from 11 normally hearing subjects, age 4-18 months, were compared with samples from 11 hearing-impaired subjects, age 4-28 months. Longitudinal data were available for all hearing babies and for 8 of the 11 hearing-impaired subjects. The analysis focused on two measures: (a) size of consonantal repertoire over time and (b) proportional occurrence of multisyllabic consonant-vowel utterances. On average, the normally hearing subjects evidenced an increase in size of their consonantal repertoires with age; in contrast, the hearing-impaired subjects in the same age range had smaller repertoires that decreased over time. Comparison of multisyllabic utterances revealed a general tendency for the hearing-impaired subjects to produce fewer multisyllabic utterances containing true consonants and for some of the hearing-impaired children to produce a high proportion of vocalizations with glides or glottal stops. These findings suggest both qualitative and quantitative differences in the babbling of the two groups.

Auditory Sensitivity and the Prelinguistic Vocalizations of Early-Amplified Infants

“…Results showed that infants with severe-to-profound hearing loss appear to have explored different types of vocalizations, mainly singletons (consonant-and vowel-like sounds) and GSs in contrast to canonical syllables. These results are consistent with previously reported results on infants with this level of impairment, showing a propensity for singleton consonants, vowels, and GSs and use of few canonical syllables (McCaffrey et al, 2000;Oller, 1986;Stoel-Gammon & Otomo, 1986). Variability in vocalization types across infants increased with increasing hearing loss.…”

“…In addition, landmark infant vocalization studies of the 1980s and early 1990s unequivocally demonstrated that early-vocalization emergence is subject to the influence of hearing sensitivity (Eilers & Oller, 1994;Oller & Eilers, 1988;Stoel-Gammon, 1988;Stoel-Gammon & Otomo, 1986). Canonical babbling is often delayed in infants with hearing loss compared with hearing infants (Eilers & Oller, 1994;Oller & Eilers, 1988).…”

“…Few studies of vocal development in infants with hearing loss have detailed the effect of hearing loss on the emergence of various aspects of canonical syllable patterns, specifically in infants with milder hearing loss. Studies have mainly focused on age of babbling onset, CBR (Eilers & Oiler, 1994;Oiler & Eilers, 1988), and segmental inventories regardless of syllabic context (e.g., Stoel-Gammon & Otomo, 1986).…”

Infant vocalizations in response to speech: Vocal imitation and developmental change

“…The onset of canonical babbling is delayed in deaf infants, and when it occurs, the babbled utterances differ in duration and timing (Kent et al, 1987;Oller and Eilers, 1988;Oller et al, 1985)" Moreover, the phonetic inventories of deaf infants differ from those of normal infants. Deaf infants rely on sounds that are visually prominent, such as /ba/ and /ma/, to a greater extent than normal infants (Stark, 1983;Stoel-Gammon, 1988;Stoel-Gammon and Otomo, 1986). The role of audition in the learning of vocalization is also suggested by the fact that adult speakers of the language speak the dialect produced locally.…”

Relationship between Rhythmic Behavior and Canonical Babbling in Infant Vocal Development

“…However, it has been clarified that the auditory experience plays an important role in the development of mature syllables [Clement and Koopmans-van Beinum, 1995;Eilers and Oller, 1994;Oller et al, 1985;Oller and Eilers, 1988;Stoel-Gammon and Otomo, 1986]. Oller and Eilers [1988] compared the phonological characteristics of the vocal behavior of 9 deaf infants with that of 21 hearing infants.…”