LanguageSpecific Patterns

1
Section Code 1203 Poster Board 204 ASHA 2008
Chicago, IL
Language-Specific Patterns Nonword Repetition
Performance in Spanish-Speaking
PreschoolersMaría R. Brea-Spahn, M.S. CCC-SLP
and Stefan A. Frisch, Ph.D.
OVERVIEW Current English and Spanish nonword
repetition tasks vary from each other in the
degree to which they have focused on the
manipulation of language-specific units. The
current experiment investigated the effect of
Spanish-specific patterns, degree of wordlikeness
and stress pattern , on the nonword repetition
performance of Spanish-speaking four- to
six-year old English language learners.
NONWORD REPETITION
LANGUAGE-SPECIFIC PATTERNS
RESULTS Q1
DISCUSSION

• Wordlikeness The extent to which a nonword
  resembles real words in an individuals native
  language lexicon
• Stress assignment in Spanish (Hualde, 2005) 95
  of nouns and adjectives follow these patterns
• Penultimate (unmarked) word final vowels or
  consonants /n/ or /s/ (e.g., báte - bat)
• Final other consonants (e.g., ciudad - city)

• Wordlikeness influenced repetition accuracy,
  replicating findings from English studies
  (Edwards et al., 2004 Gathercole, 1995
  Gathercole, Frankish, Pickering, Peaker, 1999
  Hoff, Core, Bridges, 2008).
• Stress pattern did not appear to affect
  repetition accuracy (when stimuli controlled for
  wordlikeness and phonotactic probability).
• Methodological implications
• Current Spanish NWR tasks vary from each other in
  the degree to which they have focused on the
  manipulation of language-specific units.
• Adult wordlikeness ratings a necessary
  methodological step in the development of
  nonwords and an influential factor in repetition
  accuracy in Spanish and English.
• Future studies
• Influence of vocabulary and literacy skills on
  nonword repetition in Spanish and English.
• Processing differences in nonwords with shared
  and unshared phonotactic patterns across
  languages in bilinguals

• In monolingual, English-speaking children,
  repetition accuracy correlates with established
  word knowledge and depends on the intrinsic
  characteristics of the NWR items (e.g.,
  phonotactic probability and wordlikeness, see
  Edwards, Beckman, Munson, 2004 Gathercole,
  1995). Results not yet replicated with bilingual
  Spanish-English learners.
• Not all English and Spanish NWR measures
  developed with intent to analyze the types of
  phonological knowledge that provide a basis for
  word learning.
• Systematic design of a Spanish nonword repetition
  measure Necessary initial step in the study of
  the effect of language-specific patterns on
  repetition performance.

• Repetition errors influenced by wordlikeness
• High wordlikeness lt low-wordlikeness
• Paired t-test, t(67) 3.0, p lt .01

RESEARCH QUESTIONS

• Is there an effect of wordlikeness on Spanish
  nonword repetition?
• Is there an effect of stress pattern on nonword
  repetition?

METHODS
LANGUAGE-SPECIFIC PATTERNS
RESULTS Q2

• Participants
• n 68 children
• n 21, four years of age
• n 25, five years of age
• n 22, six years of age
• Spanish language use Between 75-100 of the time
  during meal-times and other family routines
• Enrolled in low-income preschool programs
• No history of speech, language, or hearing
  disorders
• Materials
• n 36 nonwords, 2, 3, 4 syllables in length,
  with either final stress or penultimate stress
• Nonwords onset and rime constituent
  probabilities calculated from a modified version
  of the Spanish Callhome Lexicon (Linguistic Data
  Consortium)
• Constituent probabilities sensitive to position
  in word, syllable, and stress (e.g. stressed
  word-initial onset vs. unstressed word-medial
  onsets)
• Constituents randomly selected to create nonwords
• Expected probabilities of the nonwords computed
  by the product of constituent probabilities
  (Coleman Pierrehumbert 1997)
• Mean expected probabilities balanced across two
  stress patterns for each length
• Wordlikeness ratings obtained in previously
  presented study (Brea-Spahn Frisch, 2006)
• Procedure
• Nonwords were presented auditory only
• Coarse-grained (stress and syllabification) and
  fine-grained (segmental) error scoring

Sample Stimuli fabó biebaplio matrodenda

• Repetition not influenced by stress pattern,
  t(67) 1.0, p gt .05.
• Exploratory Analyses Significant Word Length x
  Stress x Wordlikeness interaction, F(2,130)
  2.1, p lt .001
• Most errors in 3 syllable, penultimate stressed
  low-wordlike nonwords (M .370, CI .341-.399)
• Reversal in wordlikeness effect for 3 syllable,
  final stressed nonwords highly wordlike gt
  low-wordlike
• Most effects from two nonwords biebaplio (high
  error rate), leiskebe (low error rate)

REFERENCES
Brea-Spahn, M. R. Frisch, S. A. (2006,
November). Wordlike or not? Segment probability,
bilingualism, and word similarity
ratings. American Speech Language Hearing
Association Convention, Miami, FL. Calderon, J.,
Gutierrez-Clellen, V. (2003, May). Nonword
repetition in emerging bilingual children with
language impairment. Paper presented at the 4th
International Symposium on Bilingualism Tempe,
AZ. Chiappe, P., Siegel, L. S., Gottardo, A.
(2002). Reading-related skills of kindergartners
from diverse linguistic backgrounds. Applied
Psycholinguistics, 23, 95-116. Coleman, J. and
Pierrehumbert, J. (1997) Stochastic Phonological
Grammars and Acceptability, 3rd Meeting of the
ACL Special Interest Group in Computational
Phonology Proceedings of the Workshop, 12 July
1997. Association for Computational Linguistics,
Somerset NJ. 49-56. Edwards, J., Beckman, M. E.,
Munson, B. (2004).  The interaction between
vocabulary size and phonotactic probability
effects on childrens production accuracy and
fluency in nonword repetition. Journal of Speech,
Language, and Hearing Research, 47,
421-436. Gathercole, S. E. (1995). Is nonword
repetition a test of phonological memory or
long-term knowledge? It all depends on the
nonwords. Memory Cognition, 23, 83-94.
Gathercole, S. E., Frankish, C. R., Pickering,
S. J., Peaker, S. (1999). Phonotactic
influences on short-term memory. Journal of
Experimental Psychology Learning Memory
Cognition, 25, 84-95. Girbau, D., Schwartz, R.
G. (2007). Nonword repetition in Spanish-speaking
children with specific language impairment.
International Journal of Language Communication
Disorders, 42(1), 59-75. Gottardo, A. (2002).
The relationship between language and reading
skills in bilingual Spanish-English speakers.
Topics in Language Disorders, 22(5), 46-70.
Gottardo, A., Collins, P., Baciu, J., Gebotys,
R. (2008). Predictors of grade 2 word reading and
vocabulary learning from grade 1 variables in
Spanish-speaking children Similarities and
differences, Learning Disabilities Research
Practice, 23 (1), 11-24 Hoff, E. , Core, C.,
Bridges, K. (2008). Nonword repetition assesses
phonological memory and is related to vocabulary
development in 20 to 24-month olds. Journal of
Child Language, 35 (4), 903-916. Hualde, J. I.
(2005). The sounds of Spanish. New York, NY
Cambridge University Press.
Contact Information Maria R. Brea-Spahn Stefan
A. Frisch mbrea_at_mtsu.edu frisch_at_cas.usf.edu