Ida J. Stockman

The Promises and Pitfalls of Language Sample Analysis as an Assessment Tool for Linguistic Minority Children

Language sample analysis (LSA) is often viewed as a nonbiased procedure for identifying language delay among linguistic minorty children. This article offers a critical discussion of LSA’s use as a...

The New Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-III: An Illusion of Unbiased Assessment?

This article examines whether changes in the ethnic minority composition of the standardization sample for the latest edition of the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT-III, Dunn & Dunn, 1997) can be used as the sole explanation for childrens better test scores when compared to an earlier edition, the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-Revised (PPVT-R, Dunn & Dunn, 1981). Results from a comparative analysis of these two test editions suggest that other factors may explain improved performances. Among these factors are the number of words and age levels sampled, the types of words and pictures used, and characteristics of the standardization sample other than its ethnic minority composition. This analysis also raises questions regarding the usefulness of converting scores from one edition to the other and the type of criteria that could be used to evaluate whether the PPVT-III is an unbiased test of vocabulary for children from diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds.

Authentic Assessment as an Approach to Preschool Speech-Language Screening

Authentic assessment procedures have been advocated to evaluate speech and language skills of preschool children from multicultural, low-socioeconomic backgrounds. In this article we discuss our us...

Evidence for a minimal competence core of consonant sounds in the speech of African American children: A preliminary study

Most studies have stressed those aspects of African American English (AAE) that differ from Standard English (SE) varieties. Therefore word‐ final consonant performance has been investigated most often. In contrast, this intensive study aimed to reveal whether a common core of initial consonants is used by typically developing AAE children at or close to the 3rd birthday. More than 2000 phonetically transcribed utterances were extracted from the audiovisual archives of natural samples of speech for seven children. All seven children met the productivity criterion for a shared core of 15 sounds in their repertoire of correctly produced word‐initial consonants. The children also met the criterion for using word‐initial consonant clusters or blends that commonly included the stop+sonorant type. The results provided preliminary evidence for a minimal competence core of word‐initial consonants that is consistent with developmental data on typically developing speakers of SE and other languages besides English. Sample sizes of more than 50 spontaneous utterances were required to elicit these core features. Research and clinical implications of these results are discussed.

Autonomous mental development: Workshop on development and learning (WDL)

This article describes a workshop on mental development and learning issues that are relevant to both machine and human sciences. It was jointly funded by the National Science Foundation and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and held at Michigan State University on 5 to 7 April 2000.

BE, DO, and Modal Auxiliaries of 3-Year-Old African American English Speakers.

PURPOSE This study examined African American English-speaking childrens use of BE, DO, and modal auxiliaries. METHOD The data were based on language samples obtained from 48 three-year-olds. Analyses examined rates of marking by auxiliary type, auxiliary surface form, succeeding element, and syntactic construction and by a number of child variables. RESULTS The children produced 3 different types of marking (mainstream overt, nonmainstream overt, zero) for auxiliaries, and the distribution of these markings varied by auxiliary type. The childrens nonmainstream dialect densities were related to their marking of BE and DO but not modals. Marking of BE was influenced by its surface form and the succeeding verbal element, and marking of BE and DO was influenced by syntactic construction. CONCLUSIONS Results extend previous studies by showing dialect-specific effects for childrens use of auxiliaries and by showing these effects to vary by auxiliary type and childrens nonmainstream dialect densities. Some aspects of the childrens auxiliary systems (i.e., pattern of marking across auxiliaries and effects of syntactic construction) were also consistent with what has been documented for children who speak other dialects of English. These findings show dialect-specific and dialect-universal aspects of African American English to be present early in childrens acquisition of auxiliaries.

Another Look at Semantic Relational Categories and Language Impairment.

Earlier comparative studies of language-impaired and normal children involved semantic-relational analyses of broad categories (e.g., action, locative action, and so on) in which utterance types were not differentiated. In this study, locative action utterances were differentiated by the types of locative words used singly and in combination. The types of utterances used by a language-impaired child were tracked between 1 year 6 months and 3 years and compared with those of three age- and MLU-matched normal children. The results suggested that differences in the semantic properties of language-impaired and normal childrens utterances may go undetected unless a fine-grained analysis is performed on the types of expressions used within a global relational category. The potential value of extending semantic-relational analyses by exploring word use in syntactic contexts is addressed.

Variable word initial and medial consonant relationships in children's speech sound articulation

The heterogeneous nature of consonants in the medial position of words may have prevented earlier studies from depicting a clear phonetic relationship between them and consonants in the initial and final positions. In this study, auditory perceptual judgments of childrens consonant productions in the initial position of words were compared with those on medial consonants varying in number and order. Neither the perceived frequency of correct articulation nor the error pattern differentiated single consonants in the initial and medial positions of words at any age. Performance on consonant blends in the initial position of words differed from that on both types of medial sequences, but it was more similar to medial consonant sequences that corresponded with permissible word initial blends than to those that did not. It was concluded that initial and medial consonants may be regarded as performance equivalents only under certain conditions.

Listener reliability in assigning utterance boundaries in children's spontaneous speech

Research and clinical practices often rely on an utterance unit for spoken language analysis. This paper calls attention to the problems encountered when identifying utterance boundaries in young childrens spontaneous conversational speech. The results of a reliability study of utterance boundary assignment are described for 20 females with graduate professional education in speech–language pathology. They judged audiorecorded spontaneous speech samples that were elicited from 4-year-old children. Their agreement with each other (interobserver) was significantly lower than their self-agreement (intraobserver). Interobserver agreement varied with the length/grammatical complexity of response turns, and the number and types of selective boundary cues presented in the speech stimuli. The findings have research and clinical implications for the utterance as a conceptual notion and its use constraints.

Development of Auxiliaries in Young Children Learning African American English

PURPOSE We examined language samples of young children learning African American English (AAE) to determine if and when their use of auxiliaries shows dialect-universal and dialect-specific effects. METHOD The data were longitudinal language samples obtained from two children, ages 18 to 36 months, and three children, ages 33 to 51 months. Dialect-universal analyses examined age of first form and early uses of BE, DO, and modal auxiliaries. Dialect-specific analyses focused on rates of overt marking by auxiliary type and syntactic construction and for BE by surface form and succeeding element. RESULTS Initial production of auxiliaries occurred between 19 and 24 months. The childrens forms were initially restricted and produced in syntactically simple constructions. Over time, they were expanded in ways that showed their rates of marking to vary by auxiliary type, their rates of BE and DO marking to vary by syntactic construction, and their rates of BE marking to vary by surface form and succeeding element. CONCLUSIONS Development of auxiliaries by young children learning AAE shows both dialect-universal and dialect-specific effects. The findings are presented within a development chart to guide clinicians in the assessment of children learning AAE and in the treatment of AAE-speaking children with language impairment.