The generalization through the treatment with fricatives: favorable environments versus unfavorable and neutral environments

The aim of this study was to analyze and compare the occurrence and the types of generalization observed through the treatment of the fricatives /z/, /ʃ/ and /ʒ/ in two groups of children, one using words with favorable phonological contexts and another with unfavorable and neutral contexts. Six children with phonological disorder between 4:7 and 7:8 year-old participated in the study, with their parents’ authorization. There were speech-language and complementary evaluations to diagnose the phonological disorder. The subjects were matched according to the severity of the phonological disorder, sex, age and aspects of the phonological system in relation to the altered phonemes. Half the children were treated with words in which the phonemes /z/, /ʃ/ and /ʒ/ were in favorable phonological environments and the other half with unfavorable and neutral environments. There were eight sessions and, after them, a new speech evaluation was performed in order to verify the types of generalization that were obtained. The generalization percentages were compared between the groups by statistical test Mann-Whitney (p<0.05). At the end of therapy, it was observed an increasing in generalization percentage for all the subjects. In the comparison between the groups, no statistical difference was found to the analyzed generalizations. However, there was an advantage to for the favorable group regarding to the generalizations “to another position in the word” and “inside a sound class”. The obtained results can be related to the small number of subjects or to other factors mentioned in the article.