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Language Development

Language Development

Children master language quickly and with relative ease, supported by both biological predisposition and reinforcement. B. F. Skinner (1957) proposed that language is learned through reinforcement, while Noam Chomsky (1965) argued that language acquisition mechanisms are biologically determined.
The critical period for language acquisition suggests that the ability to acquire language is at its peak early in life. As people age, this proficiency decreases. Language development begins very...

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Related Experiment Video

Updated: May 24, 2026

Behavioral Assessment of Hearing in 2 to 4 Year-old Children: A Two-interval, Observer-based Procedure Using Conditioned Play-based Responses

Behavioral Assessment of Hearing in 2 to 4 Year-old Children: A Two-interval, Observer-based Procedure Using Conditioned Play-based Responses

Published on: January 23, 2017

Assessing toddlers' speech-sound discrimination.

Rachael Frush Holt¹, Kaylah Lalonde

¹Department of Speech and Hearing Sciences, Indiana University, 200 South Jordan Avenue, Bloomington, IN 47405, USA. raholt@indiana.edu

International Journal of Pediatric Otorhinolaryngology

|March 10, 2012

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Modified speech perception tests reliably assess toddlers' ability to distinguish speech sounds. This new method shows promise for identifying developmental delays and evaluating interventions in young children.

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Last Updated: May 24, 2026

Behavioral Assessment of Hearing in 2 to 4 Year-old Children: A Two-interval, Observer-based Procedure Using Conditioned Play-based Responses

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Area of Science:

Auditory Perception
Developmental Psychology
Speech-Language Pathology

Background:

Assessing speech perception in toddlers is crucial for understanding development and evaluating interventions.
Current methods are limited, creating gaps in knowledge and clinical tools.
The Change/No-Change procedure is a potential tool but requires modification for toddlers.

Purpose of the Study:

To evaluate speech-sound discrimination in toddlers using a modified Change/No-Change procedure.
To assess the reliability and sensitivity of the modified procedure to age and contrast difficulty.

Main Methods:

Normal-hearing 2- and 3-year-olds participated in a repeated measures and factorial design.
Speech-sound contrasts (easy and hard) were presented.
Performance was measured using d', analyzed with ANOVAs, and test-retest reliability was calculated.

Main Results:

Toddlers discriminated easy speech-sound contrasts better than hard ones (p<.0001).
Older toddlers performed better than younger ones (p<.0001).
Test-retest reliability was excellent (r=.886, p<.0001), with most children meeting criteria.

Conclusions:

The modified procedure is a reliable and sensitive tool for assessing speech-sound discrimination in toddlers.
This method shows potential for clinical use in populations with phonological encoding deficits.
Further development could support applications for children with hearing loss, language impairments, reading difficulties, and second-language learners.