Minimal pair distinctions and intelligibility in preschool children with and without speech sound disorders

Listeners' identification of young children's productions of minimally contrastive words and predictive relationships between accurately identified words and intelligibility scores obtained from a 100-word spontaneous speech sample were determined for 36 children with typically developing speech (TDS) and 36 children with speech sound disorders (SSD) of unknown origin in three age groups (3+, 4+ and 5+ years). Each child's productions of 78-word stimuli were recorded and presented to unfamiliar adults for forced-choice identification. Results of a two-way MANOVA (two groups by three ages) indicated that the TDS group had significantly higher (p < 0.001) percent consonant items correct (PCIC) and percent syllable shape items correct. Stepwise regression analyses revealed significant predictors of intelligibility scores to be PCIC (adjusted R(2) = 0.10, p = 0.04) for the TDS group and PCIC and percent vowel items correct (adjusted R(2) = 0.63, p < 0.001) for the SSD group.