Presentation to the
Child Phonology Conference, ASU, Tempe AZ
May 14, 2004
Development of contrastive and noncontrastive phonological features in AfricanAmerican English learning children,
ages 4 to 12.
Barbara Zurer Pearson, Shelley Velleman, Timothy Bryant,
Lamya Abdulkarim, & Harry N. Seymour
University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA
Research supported by NIH contract N01-DC-8-2104
*webpage:www.umass.edu/aae
Contact for information: bpearson@comdis.umass.edu
Presentation to the
Child Phonology Conference, ASU, Tempe AZ
May 14, 2004
With special thanks to
The Psychological Corporation,
who collected the data,
Paul Speckels,
who helped archive it,
a host of dedicated grad students, and
our colleagues in the
UMass NIH Working Groups on AAE.
Distinguishing two threads of
development
• Specific to AAE
• Common to AAE
• NOT characteristic of
MAE
• AND MAE
(Mainstream American English)
CONTRASTIVE
NONCONTRASTIVE
CONTRASTIVE
NONCONTRASTIVE
• AAE Phon. Features
– (prosody/pitch)
– (stress patterns)
– (common metathesis: “aks”)
• Segmental features
(esp. , 
substitutions, post
vocalic /r/)
• Phonotactic features
(final clusters)
(medial clusters)
• Late segmental
features /r/, /s/ .
(not ,  )
• Clusters (in initial
position)
CONTRASTIVE
NONCONTRASTIVE
• IDENTIFIER
function
• DIAGNOSTIC
function
• Developmental
changes (mostly)
after 6 or 7
• Developmental
changes (mostly)
before 6 or 7
Research Questions
Contrastive Features:
• How prevalent are contrastive features in a general
AAE child population?
– Ages 4-6?
– Ages 7-12?
• How different are they from
– MAE-TD (typically developing) patterns?
– MAE-LI (language-impaired) patterns
on the same set of features?
Questions
Non-Contrastive Features:
• On Non-Contrastive features, how equivalent are
MAE and AAE typical development?
• Do we see any effect of contrastive patterns in
non-contrastive development, e.g. in substitution
patterns, sequence of acquisition?
To test segmental development:
TD
LI
Total
AAE
541
242
783
MAE
320
155
475
Total
861
397
1258
Children tested individually for TPC by SLPs.
Other characteristics of the sample:
• M/F 51-49%
• South (58%), North Central (26%),
Northeast (7%), West (9%)
• Parent Education Level 79% ≤ HS
• Identified as “articulation disorder” 168
Sample of Phonologically Impaired
Children
• 151 in the 4 major groups, all but 7 in LI groups
• 17 extra children
• By age:
4-6 average n = 40;
7-12 average n= 10
(8 and 10, n= 16, other ages < 10)
Format
• Sentence repetition, target embedded in carrier
phrase “I see……..”
66 words, 2 targets each = 132 targets
44 Contrastive: 88 Non-contrastive
Copyright 2000 The Psychological Corporation
….a mask; ….that fish breathe under water; …..a dentist
Singleton stimuli
Initial 21 types All (but /p/)
31tokens
Final 19 types All
33 tokens
Non
Contrastive
Contrastive
Also contrastive, 8 post-vocalic /r/ in clusters
(tallied by phone as well as cluster) + theta and eth
Cluster Stimuli
(types/tokens)
Non-Contrastive
Contrastive
CC initial
16/ (21)
Kr-, fr-, pr-, tr-, gr- r-,rSm-, st-, sk-, sp-,
kr-, kl-, gl
CCC initial
3/(4)
Skr-, spl-
CC medial
14/ (16)
CCC medial 4
CC final
15/ (19)
Str-nd-, -nt-, -st-, -l-, -ld-fr-, -sk--kt-, -ft-, -br- -t-, -rp-r-d-, --br-, -ntr-,
-str-st, -sk, -r , -rd, -rt, rl, -rs, -lt, -nt, -ks, -mp,
-ft, -ld, -lt, -rf
Coding for Contrastive Features
• Match to MAE – Match to predicted AAE
-- Other --NR
– We have child’s production (but not in IPA)
– (Some actual protocols, but mostly files with responses,
scoring, and coding for each element in cluster.)
• TALLY Dialect Identifiers:
# of MAE; # of AAE
(“other” ignored)
Coding for Non-Contrastive Features
• Match -- Substitution -- Omission -- Distortion -- Addition
-- Other --NR
• NON CONTRASTIVE - Diagnostic
–
–
–
–
Match = correct = 1
Substitution (any) = incorrect = 0
Omission (any) = incorrect = 0
Other = 0
• TALLY: # of correct
– (also can recover % correct by position, type, target, etc.)
Contrastive Results, Overall
Contrastive Results, Overall (cont.)
Contrastive Results by FEATURE
Contrastive Results by FEATURE (cont.)
Medial Clusters
1
0.9
AAE-4s
MAE 4s
AAE-5s
MAE-5s
AAE-6s
MAE 6s
0.8
0.7
0.6
0.5
PLANT
DENTIST
GIFT
LIFTING
Medial position gives some facilitation, but clusters are still not noncontrastive.
Contrastive Results by FEATURE (cont.)
/θ/ substitutions
A clear pattern through the age range, although 8s and 9s are about 50% for θ.
Contrastive Results by FEATURE (cont.)
Final Consonant Absent (TD only, no artic)
0.8
0.8
0.7
0.7
Av # of omissions
Av. # of omissions
Post-vocalic /r/ Absent (TD only, no artic)
0.6
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.6
0.5
0.2
0.1
0
0
5
6
7-8
Age Years
Pattern 1 difference after 7;
9-10
11-12
MAE-TD
0.3
0.1
4
AAE-TD
0.4
4
5
6
7-8
9-10
11-12
Age Years
Pattern 2 difference before 9.
Summary of Contrastive Results
• Yes, there is a small group of segmental items that can
effectively separate AAE from MAE
• (better identification uses Morphosyntax as well)
• Phonologically impaired group differs significantly from
AAE TD on these features, but not hugely so.
• CONTRASTIVE
• for DIALECT IDENTIFICATION
• NOT Diagnosis of Disorder
Non-contrastive Results
Non-contrastive Results (cont.)
Non-contrastive Results
from Charko & Velleman, 2003a, 2003b
• AAE/MAE children number of errors not different
• By age 6 (but not 4 and 5), AAE children making more
phonotactic errors than MAE
– TD (at 6): AAE 43% vs MAE 26% (p < .0001)
– LI (at 6): AAE 62% vs MAE 38% (p = .03)
• Flip side of the coin:
• MAE make more significantly more segmental errors
(by age 6)
• Which segments?
Non-Contrastive Results by FEATURE
initial //
Small AAE advantage for /r/
p = .034 by chi-square
Non-Contrastive Results by FEATURE (cont.)
// in initial clusters
Similar pattern as rope, difference at 5 and 6 years, (not tractor, truck, drive,
present)
Non-Contrastive Results by FEATURE (cont.)
// in contrastive clusters
Even in contrastive phonemes, /r/ is relatively preserved.
Highly contrastive feature /θ/ in “noncontrastive” position
Initial /TH/ in "think" by Dialect and Age
1
0.9
0.8
By age
0.7
0.6
0.5
0.4
AAE 4-6
ages 7-9
MAE 4-6
ages 7-9
Note that by 8, AAE are at target, whereas MAE are at target at 6 years, ie.
It’s less contrastive, but still delayed.
Results: Same phone /s/ in contrastive
(C#) and non-contrastive (#C) positions
percent match to target
0.96
0.94
AAE-4
AAE-5
AAE-6
0.92
0.9
MAE-4
MAE-5
MAE-6
0.88
0.86
0.84
GLASS
SALT
AAE slight advantage at age 5 both initially and finally for /s/.
Do Substitution Patterns differ by
dialect?
• Ex. do AAE-learning
children lisp less
(substitute “theta” for
/s/)? i.e. This might be
an expected pattern,
given the rarity of
theta in the AAE
phonological system.
No.
AAE % of s--> 
117/668 = 18%
MAE %
42/333 = 12%
Substitution Patterns
• Are AAE-learning
children more
likely to substitute
[f] for // in
“think”?
No.
i.e. This might be an
expected pattern, given the
prevalence of  --> f in the
AAE phonological system
AAE % of  --> f
4/565 = < 1%
MAE % of  --> f
9/364 = 2.5%
Diagnostic Implications
• CONTRASTIVE features should be avoided in diagnostic
situations. Most phonemes are not contrastive per se, but
are by virtue of their position or participation in a
consonant cluster.
• Some phonemes are contrastive no matter where they
occur.
• Use only NON-CONTRASTIVE features in noncontrastive positions for Initial Diagnosis.
• (Once a disorder has been determined, fuller evaluation of
all phones in all positions is in order.)
Diagnostic Proposal
• The DELV screener contains morphosyntax and phonology
Identifier Items on which AAE-speaking children produce
systematically different responses from MAE. This is not
part of the diagnostic scoring.
• It also contains a set of dialect-neutral Diagnostic Items
designed to tell the clinician whether further testing is
needed because the child is at risk for language delay or
impairment.
How does this help?
• By avoiding areas that are different across dialects, we
attempt to reduce the problem of false representation of
children who speak dialects such as AAE.
• Give up some phonemes (elements of morpho-syntax) that
distinguish disorder in the MAE population, but those
children also show disorders on the non-contrastive items.
• Fortunately, we find rich evidence for alternatives!
Interventions implications:
That’s another talk!
But, see discussion of this topic (choosing the order of
intervention according to dialect issues) in
Seymour, H.N. (2004). A non-contrastive model for
assessment of phonology. In H. Seymour & B. Z. Pearson
(Eds.), Evaluating language variation: Distinguishing
dialect and development from disorder. Seminars in
Speech and Language, 25 (1), pp. 96-97.
References
•
•
•
•
•
Charko, T. & Velleman, S. (2003, July). The influence of
dialect of children’s phonotactic constraint rankings (ND
children). Poster presented at the Child Phonology Conference,
UBC.
Charko, T. & Velleman, S. (2003, Nov.). The influence of
dialect of children’s phonotactic constraint rankings (LI
children). Poster presented at the Child Phonology Conference,
UBC.
Seymour, H.N. & Pearson, B. Z. (Eds.), Evaluating language
variation: Distinguishing dialect and development from
disorder. Seminars in Speech and Language, 25 (1),
DELV (next slide).
Craig, H. K. & Washington,J. A. (2004). Grade-related
changes in the production of African American English. JSHR,
47(2), 450-463.
Shameless Commerce Division
• Seymour, Roeper & de Villiers, 2003. DELV
Diagnostic Evaluation of Language Variation,
Screening Test and Criterion-Referenced. San
Antonio, TX: The Psychological Corporation,
Harcourt Assessment, Inc.
– (Includes phonology domain, 25 dialect-neutral , non-contrastive
items. If it identifies a problem, one needs to do a fuller
evaluation. Focused on later-developing areas (clusters with
liquids or /s/. Not geared to pick up garden variety developmental
errors)