Consonant Lingual-Palatal Contacts Produced by Normal-Hearing and Hearing-Impaired Children

Abstract

Ten normal hearing (NH) and 18 profoundly hearing-impaired (HI) children were recorded using palatometry and audiotape while producing the consonants /t,d,k,g,s,z,∫/ in CV syllables (V=/i, α/). The lingual-palatal contacts produced by the NH subjects for the alveolar stops were undifferentiated across voicing and vowel environment differences. Lingual-palatal contact patterns for the velar stops differed for vowel environment but not for voicing. The /s/ and /z/ sibilants were distinguished by groove width but not anterior place. Groove locations for /s/ and /z/ were more anterior than groove locations for /∫/. The anterior grove location for the /∫/ was vowel dependent. The HI subjects produced idiosyncratic lingual-palatal contact patterns. As patterns for individuals became more unique and less variable across the syllable stimuli, listener identifications showed correspondingly incorrect, undifferentiated responses. The atypical contact patterns used by the HI subjects often required interpretation of possible tongue activities during attempts at the various consonants.

Articulatory variability during consonant production by Greek speakers with hearing impairment: an electropalatographic study

“…The findings agree with previous EPG studies reporting deviant production of sibilants, velar stops, and liquids (e.g. Dagenais and Critz-Crosby, 1991;Fletcher et al, 1991;Dagenais et al, 1994;Crawford, 1995). Bernhardt et al (2003, p. 203) noted that sibilants and liquids were the 'least well-established' consonant categories across the adolescent speakers of their study.…”

“…More recently, important insights into the articulatory characteristics of consonantal segments have been gained by the use of experimental techniques such as electropalatography (EPG). Dagenais and Critz-Crosby (1991) provided a description and categorization of gestures occurring during obstruent production in the speech of unintelligible 10-15-year-old children with hearing impairment. They reported a higher frequency of open gestures during the production of alveolar and velar obstruents and of grooved gestures during postalveolar fricatives.…”

Normal adult speakers' tongue palate contact patterns for alveolar oral and nasal stops

“…Previous studies have shown that the EPG patterns recorded from older school age children are similar to younger children, but older children have somewhat less contact overall (Dagenais and Critz-Crosby, 1991;Fletcher, 1989). In addition, the hard palates of cleft speakers (at least those who have a cleft of the alveolus) tend to be smaller, narrower, and more irregular in shape than those of normal speakers.…”

“…A number of previous EPG studies of normal adult speakers' productions of alveolar stops have shown that /t/, /d/ and /n/ do in fact have similar "horseshoe" shaped configurations (Dagenais, Lorendo and McCutcheon, 1994;Goozée, Murdoch and Theodoros, 1999;Hardcastle and Gibbon, 1997;McLeod and Roberts, 2005;McLeod, 2006;McAuliffe, Ward and Murdoch, 2001;Stone and Lundberg, 1994). EPG studies show that normal speakers (adults and children) produce this horseshoe configuration by a combination of lateral bracing and an upward movement of the tongue tip/blade to the alveolar ridge (Dagenais and Critz-Crosby, 1991;Fletcher, 1989). An important additional feature is that speakers need to "tense the lateral borders of the tongue to produce a spoonshaped configuration" (Fletcher, 1992, p. 99).…”

Articulatory placement for /t/, /d/, /k/ and /g/ targets in school age children with speech disorders associated with cleft palate

“…Two children (aged 10 and 12 years) with normal vocal tract structure and typical speech development provided a limited amount of normative data. Additional normative data were available in previously published studies (Dagenais and Critz-Crosby, 1991;Fletcher, 1989), which reported data from 19 typically developing children aged 6-14 years.…”