Children with Down syndrome (DS) are reported to experience difficulty with spoken and written language which can persist through the lifespan. However, little is known about the spoken and written language profiles of children with DS in the New Zealand social and education environment, and a thorough investigation of these profiles has yet to be conducted. The few controlled interventions to remediate language deficits in children with DS that are reported in the literature typically focus on remediation of a single language domain, with the effectiveness of interventions which integrate spoken and written language goals yet to be explored for this population. The experiments reported in this thesis aim to address these areas of need. The following questions are asked 1) What are the phonological awareness, speech, language and literacy skills of New Zealand children with DS? 2) What are the home and school literacy environments of New Zealand children with DS and how do they support written language development? and 3) What are the immediate and longer term effects of an integrated phonological awareness intervention on enhancing aspects of spoken and written language development in young children with DS? These questions will be addressed through the following chapters. The first experiment (presented in Chapter 2) was conducted in two parts. Part 1 consisted of the screening of the early developing phonological awareness, letter knowledge, and decoding skills of 77 primary school children with DS and revealed considerable variability between participants on all measures. Although some children were able to demonstrate mastery of the phoneme identity and letter knowledge skills, floor effects were also apparent. Data were analysed by age group (5 - 8 years and 9 -14 years) which revealed increased performance with maturation, with older children outperforming their younger peers on all measures. Approximately one quarter of all children were unable to decode any words, 6.6% demonstrated decoding skills at a level expected for 7 - 8 year old children and one child demonstrated decoding skills at an age equivalent level. Significant relationships between decoding skills and letter knowledge were found to exist. In Part 2 of the experiment, 27 children with DS who participated in the screening study took part in an in-depth investigation into their speech, phonological awareness, reading accuracy and comprehension and narrative language skills. Results of the speech assessments revealed the participants’ speech was qualitatively and quantitatively similar to the speech of younger children with typical development, but that elements of disorder were also evident. Results of the phonological awareness measures indicated participants were more successful with blending than with segmentation at both sentence and syllable level. Rhyme generation scores were particularly low. Reading accuracy scores were in advance of reading comprehension, with strong relationships demonstrated between reading accuracy and phonological awareness and letter knowledge. Those children who were better readers also had better language skills, producing longer sentences and using a greater number of different words in their narratives. The production of more advanced narrative structures was restricted to better readers. In the second experiment (presented in Chapter 3), the home literacy environment of 85 primary school aged children with DS was investigated. Parents of participants completed a questionnaire which explored the frequency and duration of literacy interactions, other ways parents support and facilitate literacy, parents’ priorities for their children at school, and the child’s literacy skills. Results revealed that the homes of participants were generally rich in literacy resources, and that parents and children read together regularly, although many children were reported to take a passive role duding joint story reading. Many parents also reported actively teaching their child letter names and sounds and encouraging literacy development in other ways such as language games, computer use, television viewing and library access. Writing at home was much less frequent than reading, and the allocation of written homework was much less common than reading homework. In the third experiment (presented in Chapter 4), the school literacy environment of 87 primary school aged children with DS (identified in the second experiment) was explored. In a parallel survey to the one described in Chapter 3, the teachers of participants completed a questionnaire which explored the frequency and duration of literacy interactions, the role of the child during literacy interactions, the child’s literacy skills, and other ways literacy is supported. The results of the questionnaire revealed nearly all children took part in regular reading instruction in the classroom although the amount of time reportedly dedicated to reading instruction was extremely variable amongst respondents. The average amount of time spent on reading instruction was consistent with that reported nationally and in advance of the international average for Year 5 children. Reading instruction was typically given in small groups or in a one on one setting and included both ‘top-down’ and bottom up’ strategies. Children were more likely to be assigned reading homework compared to written homework, with writing activities and instruction reported to be particularly challenging. In the fourth experiment (reported in Chapter 5), the effectiveness of an experimental integrated phonological awareness intervention was evaluated for ten children with DS, who ranged in age from 4;04 to 5;05 (M = 4;11, SD = 4.08 months). The study employed a multiple single-subject design to evaluate the effect of the intervention on participants’ trained and untrained speech measures, and examined the development of letter knowledge and phonological awareness skills. The 18 week intervention included the following three components; 1. parent implemented print referencing during joint story reading, 2. speech goals integrated with letter knowledge and phoneme awareness activities conducted by the speech-language therapist (SLT) in a play based format, and 3. letter knowledge and phoneme awareness activities conducted by the computer specialist (CS) adapted for presentation on a computer. The intervention was implemented by the SLT and CS at an early intervention centre during two 20 minute sessions per week, in two 6 week therapy blocks separated by a 6 week break (i.e. 8 hours total). The parents implemented the print referencing component in four 10 minute sessions per week across the 18 week intervention period (approximately 12 hours total). Results of the intervention revealed all ten children made statistically significant gains on their trained and untrained speech targets with some children demonstrating transfer to other phonemes in the same sound class. Six children demonstrated gains in letter knowledge and nine children achieved higher scores on phonological awareness measures at post-intervention, however all phonological awareness scores were below chance. The findings demonstrated that dedicating some intervention time to facilitating the participants’ letter knowledge and phonological awareness was not at the expense of speech gains. The fifth experiment (presented in Chapter 6) comprises a re-evaluation of the speech, phonological awareness, and letter knowledge, and an evaluation of the decoding and spelling development in children with DS who had previously participated in an integrated phonological awareness intervention (see Chapter 5), after they had subsequently received two terms (approximately 20 weeks) of formal schooling. Speech accuracy was higher at follow-up than at post-intervention on standardised speech measures and individual speech targets for the group as a whole, with eight of the ten participants demonstrating increased scores on their individual speech targets. Group scores on both letter knowledge measures were higher at follow-up than at post-intervention, with nine participants maintaining or improving on post-intervention performance. The majority of participants exhibited higher phonological awareness scores at follow-up on both the phoneme level assessments, with above chance scores achieved by five participants on one of the tasks, however, scores on the rhyme matching task demonstrated no evidence of growth. Some transfer of phonological awareness and letter knowledge was evident, with five children able to decode some words on the single word reading test and three children able to represent phonemes correctly in the experimental spelling task. The emergence of these early literacy skills highlighted the need for ongoing monitoring of children’s ability to transfer their improved phonological awareness and letter knowledge to decoding and spelling performance. In the sixth experiment (presented in Chapter 7) the long term effects of the integrated phonological awareness intervention was evaluated for one boy with DS aged 5;2 at the start of the intervention. The study monitored Ben’s speech and literacy development up to the age of 8;0 (34 months post pre-school intervention) which included two years of formal schooling. Ben demonstrated sustained growth on all measures with evidence of a growing ability to transfer letter-sound knowledge and phoneme-grapheme correspondences to the reading and spelling process. The results indicated an intervention which is provided early and which simultaneously targets speech, letter knowledge and phonological awareness goals provides a promising alternative to conventional therapy, and that integrating spoken and written therapy goals for children with DS can be effective in facilitating development in both domains. This thesis provides evidence that the spoken and written language abilities of New Zealand children with DS exhibit a pattern of delay and disorder that is largely consistent with those of children with DS from other countries reported in the literature. The home and school literacy environments of children in New Zealand with DS are rich in literacy resources and are, for the most part, supportive of their literacy development. The immediate and longer term results of the integrated phonological awareness intervention suggest that it is possible to achieve significant and sustained gains in speech, letter knowledge and phonological awareness which may contribute to the remediation of the persistent and compromised spoken and written language profile characteristic of individuals with DS.

Thesis (M.A.)--Miami University, Dept. of Spanish and Portuguese, 2007. / Title from first page of PDF document. Includes bibliographical references (p. 41-43).

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico / O desenvolvimento da consciência fonológica vem ganhando muito destaque quando se discute o processo de aquisição da leitura e da escrita de jovens com dificuldades de aprendizagem. Distinguir os sons das palavras, compreender e manipular as sílabas parece afetar a capacidade para ler e escrever qualquer palavra. O presente estudo tem como objetivos verificar os efeitos de um programa de ensino para favorecer o desenvolvimento da consciência fonológica. Esse programa de ensino foi elaborado com base em estudos e nas atividades realizadas por Capovilla e Capovilla (2000), Valério (1998), Moussatché (2002), Nunes (2009), dentre outros. A pesquisa está composta por dois estudos: estudo piloto e esstudo 1. O estudo piloto, iniciado em 2012 ? foi formado por dois jovens com deficiência intelectual que frequentavam uma escola regular e apresentavam dificuldade na leitura e escrita. Um estava no início e o outro já havia passado pelo processo de alfabetização. O estudo 1 iniciado em 2013, foi formado por quatro jovens com deficiência intelectual que estavam no processo de alfabetização e frequentavam uma escola especial. A pesquisa foi realizada nas escolas onde esses alunos estavam matriculados. A análise dos testes de Prova de Consciência Fonológica proposta por Capovilla e Capovilla (2000) o pré-teste - mostrou que os sujeitos do estudo piloto apresentavam na primeira testagem bom rendimento em tarefas como aliteração e rima, mas demonstraram dificuldade na parte de segmentação, síntese e manipulação fonêmica.Com a segunda testagem, o pós-teste - realizada após a implementação de um programa para favorecer o desenvolvimento de habilidades de consciência fonológica pode-se observar uma melhora no desempenho dessas habilidades. No estudo 1, o pré-teste mostrou que os alunos apresentavam dificuldades nas atividades que envolviam as habilidades de adição, subtração e transposição fonêmica e um melhor desempenho em atividades de rima e aliteração. Na prova de leitura oral de palavras e pseudopalavras, observou-se maior dificuldade na leitura das pseudopalavras. No pós-teste, aplicado após o período de intervenção com o programa supracitado, observou-se que nas questões de rima, adição e subtração silábica, adição e subtração fonêmica e transposição silábica, os sujeitos apresentaram aumento na porcentagem de acerto das atividades. Nas atividades de aliteração, transposição fonêmica e trocadilho os sujeitos mantiveram os mesmos resultados do pré-teste ou apresentaram queda na porcentagem de acertos. Nas provas de leitura de palavras e pseudopalavras os sujeitos não demonstraram aumento na porcentagem de leitura correta, com exceção apenas de Ana Clara, que apresentou pequeno aumento no seu resultado. Na parte de compreensão de leitura, os participantes apresentaram pequena alteração no resultado, mas não temos como associar essa melhora ao desempenho nas provas de consciência fonológica. Na avaliação de ditado de palavras e pseudopalavras os alunos demonstraram aumento nos resultados / The development of phonological awareness stands out when the process of acquisition of reading and writing for young people with learning disability is discussed. Distinguishing the sounds of words, understanding and handling the syllables seems to favor the capacity of reading and writing any word. The study presented has the main objective to verify the effects of a learning program that favors the development of the phonological awareness. This learning program was created based on studies and activities experimented by Capovilla and Capovilla (2000), Valério (1998), Moussatché (2002), Nunes (2009), among other authors. The subjects involved in this research are divided between the pilot group and study number 1 group. The pilot is formed by two young people with learning disability that attended regular school and that demonstrated difficulties in reading and writing. One of the subjects was beginning the literacy process and the other had already been through it. The study one group began this work in 2013, it was formed by four young people with learning disabilities who were in literacy process and attended a special school. The analysis of the tests for Phonological Awareness Proof (Prova de Conciência Fonológica) proposed by Capovilla and Capovilla (2002) showed that the subjects of the pilot study group demonstrated good results for the first testing batch in chores like alliteration, rhyming and also demonstrated difficulties in segmentation parts, synthesis and phonemics handling. With the second testing batch, obtained after the implementation of a program favoring the development of phonological awareness, it was possible to observe the improvement of these abilities. In study number one group it was possible to observe with the first results that the students demonstrated difficulties with activities that involved actions such as adding, subtracting and phonemic transposition and a better performance in activities involving rhyming and alliteration. From the group of four students that took part of the reading tests (words and pseudowords), it was possible to observe greater difficulty to perform the reading of the pseudowords. In a late test, applied after the intervention phase, it was possible to observe that in matters of rhyming, adding and subtracting syllables, adding and subtracting phonemes and syllables transposition, the subjects demonstrated an increase of percentage of getting the activities done correctly. In the activities of alliteration, phonemic transposition and wordplay, the subjects kept the results or presented a decrease of percentage in getting the activities done correctly. In reading tests of words and pseudowords, the subjects did not demonstrate increase in the percentage of correct reading, with the exception of Ana Clara, that demonstrated a small increase in her personal results. Concerning comprehension of reading, they demonstrated little alteration in the results, but it is not possible to link this improvement to the performance of phonological awareness tests. For the assessment of words and pseudowords dictation activity, the students demonstrated and increase on their personal results

Communication problems may happen by a phonological deviation present in the speech of some children during the sounds acquisition and it may cause a limited phonetic inventory besides a simplified phonological system that will lead to a decrease in intelligibility. This study aimed at determining the correlation between intelligibility and the phonological deviation severity since the analysis of three different groups of judges. The research consisted of two samples; one sample to be assessed (subjects with phonological deviation) and another sample that comprised the judges (speech therapists, laypeople and mothers). The first sample was composed of 30 subjects, 10 female (33,3%) and 20 male (66,7%), average age 4:1 to 7:11, who presented phonological deviation determined by speech therapy, phonological tests and complementary assessments developed in the Program of Speech Therapy Assistance at UFSM. The second sample comprised the judges and it was consisted of five laypeople, five subjects with a background in the field (speech therapists and seniors from the Language Therapy graduation course at UFSM) and five subjects selected from the children s families (mothers). The speech of the subjects presenting phonological deviation was transcribed, analyzed and classified after nominalization, imitation and spontaneous speech tests. Then, it was determined the phonological deviation severity according to the Percentage of Correct Consonants (PCC) proposed by Shriberg & Kwiatkowski (1982). It was also carried out a narrative test through which it was obtained a sample of spontaneous speech that was analyzed by the judges. The pieces of narrative were drawn to be presented to the judges randomly, ranging from Speech 1 to Speech 90, accompanied by some questions of identification and description of the judges, together with a chart for the registration of intelligibility and levels of severity. Following it, it was carried out the mode of 90 pieces of narrative, which helped in the statistical analysis of the data based on Concordance Analysis by Kappa and Spearman s Correlation, using the statistics program STATA. It was verified speech intelligibility and the phonological deviation severity assessed by the group of judges, as well as the concordance between these variables. Finally, it was examined the correlation between the severity index according to PCC and the values presented by each group of judges. Regarding intelligibility, it was widely classified as regular by all groups, and it was noticed that the speech therapists were more tolerant in their assessment. It was observed that the group of speech therapists and mothers used more the category average in their assessment of severity while the laypeople group used more the category moderate-severe . There was more concordance among the groups of judges concerning the extremes in the judgment of intelligibility (good and insufficient) and also of severity (average and severe). Considering the comparison among the results by the groups of judges; mothers and laypeople presented almost the same evaluation to intelligibility, and the level of concordance was higher to intelligibility evaluated as good. In terms of severity, the similarities among the groups were stronger in the extremes (average and severe); whereas among speech therapists and mothers it was almost perfect to average and severe levels. The concordance among all the groups was substantial to the assessment of good intelligibility as well as of average and severe levels of phonological deviation severity, being more difficult the judgment and classification of mild-moderate and moderate-severe severity as well as regular intelligibility. It was found a higher correlation between the severity and the severity in PCC by speech therapists and mothers, showing that laypeople face more difficulties in presenting a precise assessment of the phonological deviation severity. The correlations between the intelligibility of the speech and the phonological deviation severity by all the groups were positive and similar to the real indexes for all the groups of judges. Therefore, it was easy to the judges analyzing and correlating the assessments according to intelligibility and severity in the narratives of the subjects. It was observed that the more unintelligible the speech was, the more severe was its classification by the groups of judges. / Problemas na comunicação podem ser ocasionados pelo desvio fonológico, presente na fala de algumas crianças em fase de aquisição dos sons. Isso poderá ocasionar um inventário fonético restrito além de um sistema fonológico simplificado o que levará a diminuição da inteligibilidade. Este estudo teve como objetivo determinar a correlação entre a inteligibilidade e a gravidade do desvio fonológico a partir da análise de três grupos de julgadores. A pesquisa foi composta de duas amostras, uma amostra a ser julgada (sujeitos com desvio fonológico) e outra julgadora (fonoaudiólogas, leigas e mães). Os 30 sujeitos julgados, 10 (33,3%) do sexo feminino e 20 (66,7%) do masculino, com idade entre 4:1 e 7:11, possuíam o diagnóstico de desvio fonológico, determinado pelas avaliações fonoaudiológica, fonológica e complementares, e foram triadas no Serviço de Atendimento Fonoaudiológico (SAF) da UFSM. A amostra julgadora constituiu-se de cinco sujeitos leigos, cinco sujeitos com formação (fonoaudiólogas e formandas do curso de Fonoaudiologia da UFSM) e cinco sujeitos de convívio (mães das crianças participantes da amostra julgada). A fala dos sujeitos com desvio fonológico foi transcrita, analisada e classificada após as provas de nomeação, imitação e fala espontânea. Após, determinou-se a gravidade do desvio fonológico a partir do Percentual de Consoantes Corretas (PCC) proposto por Shriberg & Kwiatkowski (1982). Uma prova narrativa também foi aplicada, pela qual se obteve uma amostra da fala espontânea que pôde ser analisada pelos julgadores. As narrativas foram sorteadas para apresentação em ordem aleatória aos julgadores na ordem da Fala 1 a Fala 90, e eram acompanhadas do questionário com perguntas de identificação e caracterização dos julgadores além das grades para marcação da inteligibilidade e gravidade. A partir daí, realizou-se a Moda das 90 narrativas, a qual possibilitou a análise estatística dos dados através da Análise de Concordância Kappa e da Correlação de Spearman, utilizando o programa estatístico STATA. Verificou-se a inteligibilidade da fala e a gravidade do desvio fonológico julgada pelos grupos de juízes e a concordância entre essas variáveis nos julgamentos. Finalizando, verificou-se a correlação entre o índice da gravidade do desvio fonológico a partir do PCC e os valores julgados por cada um dos grupos de juízes. Quanto à inteligibilidade da fala dos sujeitos julgados o conceito regular foi o mais utilizado por todos os grupos em seus julgamentos, e os fonoaudiólogos foram mais tolerantes em seus julgamentos. Observou-se que o grupo de fonoaudiólogas e mães utilizou mais o conceito médio em seus julgamentos para a gravidade do desvio fonológico e o grupo de leigas fez maior uso do grau moderado-severo. Houve maior concordância entre os grupos de juízes para os extremos das possibilidades de julgamento da inteligibilidade (boa e insuficiente) e também da gravidade (médio e severo). Quanto à concordância entre os grupos, as julgadoras mães e leigas tiveram concordância quase perfeita para o julgamento da inteligibilidade boa e o grau de concordância foi mais acentuado para a inteligibilidade julgada como boa. Para a gravidade do desvio fonológico, a concordância entre os grupos foi mais acentuada nos extremos (médio e severo), sendo que entre as julgadoras fonoaudiólogas e mães essa concordância foi quase perfeita para o grau médio e severo. A concordância entre todos os grupos de julgadores foi substancial para os julgamentos da inteligibilidade boa e da gravidade média e severa, sendo mais difícil o julgamento e classificação da gravidade médio-moderado e moderado-severo e da inteligibilidade regular. Notou-se uma maior correlação entre a gravidade julgada e a gravidade em PCC no grupo de julgadores fonoaudiólogas e no das mães, demonstrando que o grupo das leigas possui maior dificuldade em julgar com precisão a gravidade do desvio fonológico. As correlações entre a inteligibilidade da fala e a gravidade do desvio fonológico foram positivas e próximas da perfeita para todos os grupos de julgadores. Portanto, houve facilidade para os julgadores analisarem e correlacionarem os julgamentos quanto à inteligibilidade da fala e à gravidade do desvio fonológico das narrativas dos sujeitos. Observou-se que quanto mais foi julgada ininteligível a fala, mais severa foi a sua classificação pelos grupos de julgadores participantes.

Afin de comprendre la parole, les auditeurs ont besoin de transformer les signaux sensoriels en sens abstraits. Dans cette thèse, nous nous sommes concentrés sur les processus perceptifs liés au système des sons du langage - le traitement phonologique, et examiné les mécanismes neurobiologiques sous-jacents.Dans la première partie de la thèse, nous avons examiné l'organisation temporelle du traitement phonologique dans le cerveau humain. En utilisant des enregistrements électroencéphalographiques (EEG), nous avons étudié le décours temporel pour le traitement perceptif de règles phonologiques spécifiques à la langue maternelle des auditeurs. Les résultats montre que les connaissances des auditeurs sur les règles phonologiques complexes de leur langue maternelle sont mise en oeuvre à un stade précoce de la perception de son de la parole.Dans la deuxième partie de cette thèse, nous avons étudié l'organisation spatiale du traitement phonologique dans le cortex humain. Nous avons effectué deux études pour étudier le rôle de l'interaction sensorimotrice dans le décodage phonologique à la fois pendant la perception de la parole et la lecture. Les résultats de la première étude démontrent que le système moteur est impliqué dans la catégorisation perceptive des sons de la parole non-natifs, tantdis que ceux de la deuxième étude montrent que la réparation perceptive des séquences de lettres illégale dans la langue maternelle des auditeurs est dépendante de la disponibilité du système moteur chez les participants.L'ensemble de cette thèse fournit de nouvelles perspectives sur les aspects temporels et spatiaux de mécanismes neuronaux qui sous-tendent le traitement phonologique. / In order to understand spoken language, listeners need to transform sensory signals into abstract meanings. In this thesis, we focused on perceptual processes that deal with the sound system of spoken language – phonological processing, and examined its neurobiological underpinnings. In the first part of the thesis, we investigated the temporal organization of phonological processing in the human brain. Using electroencephalographic (EEG) recordings, we studied the time course for perceptual processing of language-specific phonological rules. Findings of this study demonstrate that listeners’ knowledge of complex phonological rules of their native language is assessed at an early stage of speech sound perception. In the second part of the thesis, we investigated the spatial organization of phonological processing in the human cortex. In particular, we conducted two studies to investigate the role of sensorimotor interaction in phonological decoding during both speech perception and reading. Results from the first study showed that the motor system is involved in the perceptual categorization of non-native speech sounds, while those from the second study demonstrated that perceptual repair of phonotactically illegal letter sequences in reader’s native language is dependent to the availability of the their motor system. Together, findings from this thesis provide new insights into temporal and spatial aspects of neural mechanisms that underlie phonological processing.

The study delves into the influence of accent and segment completion of prosodic units in speech data from two children between the ages of 1;0.4 and 2;1.10 and who were exposed to Brazilian Portuguese spoken in the states of Alagoas and Pernambuco. It was hypothesized that grammatical processing stems from two concurrent movements in opposing directions during phonological acquisition: a centripetal movement triggering segmentation of the prominent syllable and an opposing, centrifugal one aimed at segment completion of prosodic units. These analytical movements imply a hierarchical basis of relationships between its constituent structures, an assumption backed by autosegmental phonology (GOLDSMITH, 1995; CLEMENTS; HUME, 1995; MOTA, 1996) and prosodic phonology (NESPOR; VOGEL, 1986; SCARPA, 1997, 1999a; SANTOS; SCARPA, 2005). The methodology consisted of a observational and descriptive follow-up with parental consent. The children s spontaneous speech while playfully interacting with parents was digitally recorded over a 7-month period. Data showed that identifying word stress favors the handling of phonological material in the stressed syllable under centrifugal action, thus leading to segment completion of both post-tonic and pre-tonic syllables in accordance with the metrical foot of the target word. A tendency towards completion of the syllable structure and distinction of segment classes was seen in the stressed and post-tonic syllables, influenced by the prevalence of words having a trochaic stress pattern. The organizational hierarchy of the language was shown to guide and drive these movements of centripetal-centrifugal analyses that occur at different phonological levels prosodic and segmental. / O estudo investiga a influência do acento e o preenchimento segmental de unidades prosódicas em dados de fala de duas crianças entre 1;0.4 e 2;1.10 de idade, expostas ao português brasileiro falado em Alagoas e Pernambuco. Partiu-se da hipótese de processamento gramatical mediante dois movimentos de direções opostas co-ocorrentes na aquisição fonológica: a centrípeta desencadeando a segmentação da sílaba proeminente e a oposta, centrífuga, destinada aos preenchimentos segmentais das unidades prosódicas. Nesses movimentos de análises está implícita a base hierárquica das relações entre as estruturas constituintes, pressuposto defendido nas fonologias autossegmental (GOLDSMITH, 1995; CLEMENTS; HUME, 1995; MOTA, 1996) e prosódica (NESPOR; VOGEL, 1986; SCARPA, 1997, 1999a; SANTOS; SCARPA, 2005). A metodologia consistiu do acompanhamento observacional e descritivo, com o consentimento, durante sete meses, de registros de fala espontânea das crianças, em interação lúdica com os pais, gravados em áudio digital. Os dados mostraram que a identificação do acento da palavra favorece a manipulação do material fonológico na sílaba tônica, sob ação centrífuga, influenciando o preenchimento segmental tanto de sílaba pós-tônica como de pré-tônica em conformidade com pé métrico da palavra-alvo. Observou-se, no entanto, a tendência para o preenchimento da estrutura silábica e a diferenciação de classes segmentais na sílaba tônica e na pós-tônica, sob influência do predomínio de palavras com o padrão de acento troqueu. Constata-se que a hierarquia organizacional da língua rege e impulsiona esses movimentos de análises centrípeto-centrífuga que operam em diferentes níveis fonológicos prosódico e segmental.

This paper proposes that SOUND SYMBOLISM, and more specifically PHONEMIC ICONICITY, plays a role in conveying emotional weight in the context of poetry. Previous research has indicated that the ratio of plosives to nasals in poetry predicts overall perception of emotional affect, with plosives designating activity and pleasantness, and nasals designating inactivity and unpleasantness (Auracher, Albers, Zhai, Gareeva, & Stavniychuk 2010); however, this research has ignored the influence of such potentially mitigating factors as orthography and lexical meaning. The current study involves naive English L1 speakers listening to recordings of selected haiku from Matsuo Basho's Oku No Hosomichi (`Narrow Road to the Deep North') in the original Japanese, and as such, the potential of orthography and lexical meaning to influence perception of emotion is eliminated. After listening to each haiku twice, subjects were asked to rate the appropriateness of eight emotion words that ranged from active and positive to inactive and positive, and from active and negative to inactive and negative, on a five-point Likert scale. Emotion words were chosen on the basis of their respective positions on the Circumplex Model of Affect, in which each emotion is conceptualized in terms of its location along two intersecting axes measuring valence (negative - positive) and arousal (inactive - active) (Russell 1980). The selected words occupied regularly spaced positions along this two-dimensional circular model. Results indicate that plosive to nasal ratio may indeed play a role in the perception of emotion in poetry, particularly in the case of poems with high plosive to nasal ratios, which were perceived as markedly more active and positive than other poems. Wider implications of the discernible patterns of perception of emotional affect based on plosive to nasal ratio include the possibility that phonemic iconicity plays a role in general language processing. As this research involves Japanese L2 phonemic perception by naÃ&hibar;ve English L1 listeners, current L2 phonological perceptual theory is discussed, and taken into account in the analysis of the results. Specific consideration is given to the potential of English L1 speakers to perceive the Japanese rhotic /r/, which does not appear in English, as the plosives /t/ or /d/, and the Japanese affricate /ts/, which commonly appears syllable-initially in Japanese, but is much rarer in this position in English, as /s/ (Nozawa 2008). Future research on English L1 speakers' underlying perceptual categorizations of targeted sounds in Japanese is also proposed.

Due to a long history of contact with other tongues, Algerian Arabic and Maltese have massive borrowings from French and Italian respectively. In the aim of exploring the influence of linguistic contact on the types of loan adaptation in these two historically related dialects, this study analyzed a linguistic corpus of noun loans. The effect of language contact is better observed through a comparative study of the phonological and morphological change each language has undertaken. The study investigated French noun loans in Algerian Arabic, and Italian noun loans in Maltese. It specifically focused on gender, number (singular and plural) and the definite article as a means of defining the noun loans. The analysis has revealed that Maltese and Algerian Arabic both adapted the loans phonologically but also borrowed new foreign phonemes. Morphologically, they mostly preserved the noun loans genders, used the native patterns to make them plural and the article -al in the case of Algerian Arabic ,-il in the case of Maltese to make them definite. Algerian Arabic used the native patterns / a:t/, the broken plural or the collective /-ja/ plural. Maltese used the native /-jiet/ and the broken plural, however, contrary to Algerian Arabic, Maltese has also borrowed Italian plural patterns making the loan plural patterns unpredictable. The linguistic consequences of borrowing on these languages have made of Algerian Arabic a case of diffusion and of Maltese a case of diffusion and loss. Maltese has borrowed new phonemes but has lost a few native ones, notably the emphatic and velar fricative sounds, still in use in the other Arabic dialects. Algerian Arabic borrowed new phonemes but retained the native phonemes. Borrowing could not be the only factor that has ultimately rendered Maltese to be no longer considered an Arabic dialect and has made Algerian Arabic not obvious to other Arabic speakers, yet it has reinforced it. Contact with the foreign language Italian and loss of contact with the mainstream Arabic dialects was another major factor that rendered Maltese a unique Semitic variety alien even to the closest North African dialect.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-07-22T20:50:17Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2009-03-25 / A análise dos processos cognitivos subjacentes aos processos de leitura e escrita pode auxiliar na identificação de diferentes perfis de leitura. No presente estudo o objetivo foi comparar crianças disléxicas a dois grupos controle: um pareado por idade cronológica e outro pelo nível de leitura, a fim de verificar possíveis diferenças no desempenho dos grupos em uma bateria de leitura e escrita nacional. Método: foram avaliados 28 disléxicos (DX) de ambos os sexos, com idade média de 9,82 (±1,44) anos, estudantes de escolas públicas e particulares. Estes foram comparados com: 1) Grupo Controle por Idade (AC), composto por 26 leitores competentes, com idade média de 9,77 (±1,37) anos, pareados por idade, série, sexo e tipo de escola; 2) Grupo Controle por nível de leitura (RC), composto por 28 leitores com idade média de 7,82 (±1,06) anos, pareados por sexo, tipo de escola e desempenho de leitura em tarefa de compreensão de sentenças (TCSE). Os grupos foram avaliados em quatro provas da Bateria de Leitura e Escrita Computadorizada - a BALEComputadorizada: o Teste de Competência de Leitura de Sentença (TCSE), Teste de Competência de Sentença Falada (TCSF), Teste de Competência de Leitura de Palavra (TCLP) e Teste de Nomeação de Figuras por Escrita (TENOFE). Estas provas avaliam o padrão de leitura de palavras e pseudopalavras, leitura de sentenças, compreensão de sentença oral e escrita de palavras. Resultados indicaram que disléxicos apresentaram um total de acertos inferior e tempo médio de execução mais elevado, quando comparados ao grupo AC em todas as tarefas. Quando comparados ao grupo RC, não foram observadas diferenças no total de acertos das provas de leitura, nem na prova de compreensão oral. Entretanto, disléxicos permaneceram com uma lentidão no tempo de execução da leitura e obtiveram um escore total na escrita significativamente inferior, mesmo quando comparados aos leitores mais novos. Análises detalhadas dos tipos de erro na prova de leitura de palavras e pseudopalavras (TCLP) apontaram que disléxicos obtiveram escores inferiores aos dois grupos na leitura de pseudopalavras, principalmente as que envolviam um processamento fonológico, ou decodificação ortográfica. Discussão/Conclusão: Disléxicos têm desempenho semelhante ao de leitores mais novos no total de acertos de leitura de palavras e na compreensão oral de sentenças, porém déficits específicos na decodificação fonológica e no armazenamento visual (léxico), bem como na velocidade do processamento da leitura, diferem estes grupos. / The analysis of undergoing cognitive processes in reading and writing skills can help us distinguish different profiles of reading abilities. The present study aims to compare the performance of dyslexic children with two individually matched control groups (one contrasting in reading competence, but not age and a second contrasting in age, but not in reading competence) in a Brazilian Reading and Writing Battery. Participants were: 28 dyslexics of both genders, with mean age of 9,82 (±1,44) years, studying in public and private schools. These were matched to: 1) an Age Control Group (AC): composed of 26 good readers, with mean age of 9,77 (±1,44) years, matched by age, sex, years of schooling and type of school. 2) Reading Control Group (RC): composed of 28 younger controls, with a mean age of 7,82 (±1,06) years, matched by sex, type of school and reading level. All groups were tested on 4 tasks of the battery entitled “BALE”. These were: 1. Sentence Reading Comprehension Test (SRCT), 2. Sentence Hearing Comprehension Test (SHCT), 3.Picture-Print Writing Test (PPWT 1.1-Writing) and 4. Word Reading Competence Test (WRCT). Such tasks evaluate sentence reading comprehension, oral sentence comprehension, spelling and reading of isolated words and pseudowords. Results showed dyslexics obtained lower total scores and a higher execution time, when compared AC. When compared to RC, no differences in total scores of reading tasks or oral comprehension tasks were observed. However, dyslexics presented a slower reading speed, with a higher execution time and a lower score in spelling tasks, even when compared to younger controls. Detailed analysis of types of errors on word and pseudoword reading, demonstrated that dyslexics obtained lower scores in the reading of pseudowords, when compared to both groups. Such findings suggest that overall scores of dyslexics were similar to the younger readers. However, specific deficits in phonological and visual decoding, showed both groups have different underpinning reading strategies. / TEDE / BV UNIFESP: Teses e dissertações

This diploma thesis called ?Phonological skills in prevention of readers difficulty? focuses on recognizing of the relationship between phonological skills and reading in czech (transparent) language environment. Theoretical part gives a definition of dyslexia and gives her typology. It delimits the causes, diagnostics, rectification and influence of dyslexia on a child. It advises how to work with pupils with dyslexia. Practical part contains own testing of pupils´ phonological skills. It describes procedure and the method of measurement, it gives description of exercises and gained experience.