Occurrence of phonological errors according to severity in children with speech sound disorder

Purpose to describe and quantify speech errors in children with speech sound disorder according to severity calculated by the indexes percentage of consonants correct revised and process density index and also to determine whether children with different degrees of severity differ in the predominant error observed during speech production. Methods speech samples of 21 children aged between 5;2 and 7;11 years-old with speech sound disorder were analyzed. Absolute indexes of substitution, omission and distortion, percentage of consonants correct revised and process density index were calculated based on two phonology tasks (picture naming and imitation of words). Results there were differences in the predominant type of error in speech indicating that substitution was the most occurring type of error. Substitution was the most frequent type of error for the most severe children while for the less severe ones the study did not indicate a prevalent type of error. The analysis of the total sample the correlation analysis indicated that the higher the occurrence of substitution less the number of distortion. Conclusion in general terms substitution was the most frequent type of error. Equivalence of the type of errors was observed for the less sever children while substitution was the most frequent type of error for the more sever group of children. Absolute indexes were effective and efficient to indicate the most frequent type of error according to the severity of the disorder.