Relationship between auditory discrimination, articulation stimulability, and consistency of misarticulation

A study was conducted to measure the relationship between auditory discrimination, articulation stimulability, and consistency of misarticulation. Data were based on the Carter-Buck Nonsense-Syllable Imitation Test for stimulability of /s/, the McDonald Deep Test of Articulation which measured consistency of misarticulation of /s/, and the Farquhar-Bankson In-depth Test of Auditory Discrimination which measured external and internal auditory discrimination of /s/. Ss were 25 kindergarten and first grade children with normal hearing and intelligence. No S had received any speech therapy. Each S misarticulated a minimum of three /s/ items on the McDonald Screening Test of Articulation. No more than one phoneme was misarticulated in addition to misarticulation of /s/. A significant correlation between the child's ability to discriminate his own production of /s/ (internal or self-monitoring) and the consistency of misarticulation of /s/ was obtained, as well as one between the consistency of misarticulation of /s/ and the stimulability of /s/. No statistically significant correlations were found between the other variables. A low nonsignificant correlation was found between the stimulability of /s/ and internal discrimination abilities. Different types of discrimination tasks were of varying difficulty. Performance on external discrimination items was better than for internal discrimination items.