Abstract
This study reports on a longitudinal study of ten children's consonant productions. Data were analysed to determine the word initial, word medial, and word final consonant inventories of these children at 4-, 15- and 25-word points, as well as the rank order of consonant phonemes. Comparisons were made to Finnish-speaking 2-year-old children and adult speakers. Analysis of the phonetic inventories of the children indicated that the size of early inventories were somewhat smaller than those reported for children acquiring English. The types of consonant phones used in early words were in line with previous findings, as consisting primarily of stops and nasals. Finally, the results indicated a closeness to the adult language in terms of the frequent use of phonemes that carry a high functional load in the language. Thus, both universal and language specific features seem to have a role to play during the early acquisition of consonants.