What causes speech sound disorders?
Many speech sound disorders occur without a known cause. A child may not learn how to produce sounds correctly or may not learn the rules of speech sounds on his or her own. These children may have a problem with speech development, which does not always mean that they will simply outgrow it by themselves. Many children do develop speech sounds over time but those who do not often need the services of an SLP to learn correct speech sounds.
Some speech sound errors can result from physical problems, such as:
- developmental disorders (e.g.,autism)
- genetic syndromes (e.g., Down syndrome)
- hearing loss
- illness
- neurological disorders (e.g., cerebral palsy)
Children who experience frequent ear infections when they were young are at risk for speech sound disorders if the ear infections were accompanied by hearing loss.
Speaking with an accent and/or dialect is not a speech sound disorder.
How common are speech sound disorders?
In young children learning to speak, speech sound errors are quite common. In fact, very few children develop speech without producing errors early on. By the age of 8, children should be able to produce all sounds in English correctly.
Information about how many children have speech sound disorders is available in the ASHA report, Incidence and Prevalence of Communication Disorders and Hearing Loss in Children - 2007 Edition.
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See Also:
Speech Sound Disorders: Articulation and Phonological Processes
Speech Sound Disorders: Benefits of Speech-Language Pathology Services
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