The Acquisition of Phonology And Lexicon Among Typically Developing Amharic-Speaking Children.
| dc.contributor.advisor | Dr.Abebayehu Mekonnen | |
| dc.contributor.author | Fikre Diress | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2024-03-12T12:51:29Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2024-03-12T12:51:29Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2022-12 | |
| dc.description.abstract | First language acquisition is a time taking process, which requires children’s ability to master various features of their native language. The development of these components is influenced by various factors such as age of acquisition, linguistic environment, etc. Although children follow general patterns of language acquisition across languages, there are also various language-specific differences reported in the literature. This study, therefore aimed at describing patterns of phonological and lexical acquisitions in typically developing Amharic-speaking children. The Speech samples were taken from 32 children aged, between 3 to 5. Picture narration, picture descriptions, storytelling, and elicitation tasks were used to gather the data for the current study. The data were then audio- recorded, transcribed, and segmented in ELAN, a software package often used for linguistic description and documentation projects. A combination of qualitative and quantitative data analysis used. The quantitative analysis methods were used to measure the frequency of various consonant phonemes and the size of the lexicon; qualitative analysis was used to describe the developmental features of children’s phonology. The result showed that 3 to 5 years old children acquired most of the Amharic pulmonic consonants; however, the absence of /r/ and the ejectives like/p’/, /t’/,/k’/and /ʧ/ in some children’s speech implies that the acquisition of these phonemes goes beyond five years or maybe even at a later age. The result also indicated the developmental features of children’s word production. This includes substitution, deletion of weak vowels and consonants as well as cluster reduction. Assimilation and addition were also apparent in a few children’s words production. This study also attested that children’s lexicons were also composed of nouns, verbs, and adjectives. The presence of demonstratives, pronouns, prepositions, and conjunctions signaled how children’s lexicon is organized in their language developmental process. Generally, the development of phonology and lexicons interact each other, in a normal pattern of development and gender and age had a direct correlation to the development these language components. | |
| dc.identifier.uri | https://etd.aau.edu.et/handle/123456789/2357 | |
| dc.language.iso | en_US | |
| dc.publisher | Addis Ababa University | |
| dc.subject | phonological and lexical acquisitions | |
| dc.title | The Acquisition of Phonology And Lexicon Among Typically Developing Amharic-Speaking Children. | |
| dc.type | Thesis |