Phonological Processes in Younger and Older Telugu-Tamil Speaking Bilingual Children

Abstract

Bilingual children pose challenges for speech-language pathologists due to the interaction of their language systems. Research shows potential consonant errors in phonological development. It is crucial to understand the phonological characteristics of their languages (Telugu and Tamil) and the impact of age on effective intervention. The study involved 220 children in daycare and pre-primary school settings who were split into age groups of 2.6 to 3.5 years of age and 5.6 to 6.5 years of age. Speech samples were collected using Tamil and Telugu word lists and transcribed after the children repeated prerecorded samples in a quiet setting. T-tests were used for statistical analysis and revealed 24 phonological processes that are more common in younger children and 10 that are more frequent in older ones. In Tamil, younger children exhibited increased occurrences of processes like final-consonant deletion, medial-consonant deletion, weak syllable deletion, and epenthesis. In Telugu, both age groups lacked final-consonant deletion and medial-consonant deletion. Substitution processes were more frequent in younger children with significant differences in backing, fronting, deaffrication, vowelization, affrication, stopping, gliding, palatalization, voicing, and devoicing. In summary, this study enhances our understanding of bilingual phonological development, highlighting the role of language-specific influences and age-related trends.