Speech sound disorders and phonological awareness skills in Maltese children aged 4 to 6 years

Abstract

This study investigates the link between Speech Sound Disorders (SSD) and Phonological Awareness (PA) skills in Maltese children, aged 4 to 6 years. It explores the 5 sub types of SSDs using Dodd’s classification system (1995, 2005) – articulation disorder, phonological delay, inconsistent speech disorder, consistent deviant phonological disorder and developmental verbal dyspraxia. It also explores whether children with SSD present with phonological awareness difficulties and are at an increased risk for consequent reading disability (RD). Five research tools were used for the purpose of this study: a speech assessment, a phonological awareness screening tool, an intelligibility rating scale and two self-developed questionnaires – one for parents and one for teachers. 45 typically developing (TD) children and 36 children presenting with SSD were assessed on an adapted version of a phonological awareness screening tool developed by Pace-Gellel (2004). The group of children with SSD was also assessed on the Maltese-English Speech Assessment (MESA; Grech, Dodd & Franklin, 2011). Findings show that typically developing children outperformed children with SSD on all measures of the Phonological Awareness Screening Tool. Moreover, children with inconsistent and consistent phonological disorders performed less well than children presenting with articulation difficulties or phonological delays. Bilingual Maltese-English speakers performed better then monolingual speakers on all measures of phonological awareness. Participants with a family history of literacy and/or language based disorders exhibited poor phonological awareness abilities.