Nasometric Comparison Between Spanish-English Bilingual and English Monolingual Children

It is well established in the literature that English diagnostic tests should not be directly applied to speakers whose primary language is Spanish. Normative nasalance data across word and sentence-level stimuli among Spanish-English bilingual children living in the United States have not been provided. The present study aims to (1) compare differences in nasalance between typically developing Spanish-English bilingual children and English-speaking monolingual children and (2) determine whether within-speaker nasalance differences exist in Spanish-English bilingual children when presented with English and Spanish speech stimuli.

Thirty-four typically developing children including 17 monolingual English speakers and 17 Spanish-English bilingual speakers with normal velopharyngeal anatomy between 5 and 7 years of age participated in the study. Speakers were recorded using a nasometer producing sets of stimulus items at the word and sentence level in English (English monolinguals) and in both Spanish and English for bilingual children.

Results indicated no statistically significant difference between nasalance values across the different stimuli between monolingual and bilingual participants. However, within-subject effects showed statistical significance between English and Spanish word stimuli among the bilingual group.

These findings emphasize the importance of using language-specific diagnostic materials for nasalance testing, which would be of importance in the treatment of individuals with cleft palate.