Phonological representations and developmental speech disorders

Studies focus on the role of phonological awareness and phonological representations in atypical speech development and speech change. Also on the development of phonological representations in young children and their relationship to literacy skills.

A related area (linked with the Social communication and pragmatics intervention theme) is the assessment of intelligibility as the ultimate functional aim of intervention for children with disordered speech. We are also investigating the status of phonological representations in young children via implicit and explicit tasks, and their relationship with exposure to literacy.

We explore development and computational modelling of phonological representations in young children, in collaboration with colleagues from NARU, and examine factors contributing to and affecting developmental speech disorders: why some children are hard to understand and how we can help them.

Principal investigators

Name	Job title	Email address
Anne Hesketh	Clinical Senior Lecturer in Speech and Language Therapy	anne.hesketh@manchester.ac.uk