An Optimality Analysis and Treatment of Phonological Disorders in the Speech of Jordanian Children: A Case Study

Abstract

This paper presents a case study of a Jordanian child with phonological speech disorders. It seeks to investigate functional phonological disorders and their treatment among Jordanian children within an Optimality Theoretic (OT) perspective. It aims to provide treatment for children’s speech errors within a constraint-based system. The analysis of the data identifies seven error patterns in the child’s productions, namely: fronting, lateralization, stopping, devoicing, de-emphasization, syllable deletion and cluster reduction. Furthermore, OT is employed at the end of the study as a guideline to select the priority of treatment goals by demoting responsible markedness constraints below faithfulness constraints.