Acquisition of the “Rendaku” phenomenon in Japanese compound nouns in school-age children with hearing impairment and normal hearing

Abstract

　This study was aimed at clarifying the age of acquisition of the use of compound words in school-age children diagnosed as being hard of hearing (HH) and having normal hearing (NH). We examined the effect of the “Rendaku” phenomenon, in which a word-initial voiceless obstruent of the second member becomes voiced. A total of 6 HH children and 41 NH children participated in this study and performed two tasks, namely, the combination and/or division of words tasks. In these two tasks, the subjects were instructed to combine two words or divide a compound word into two, respectively. As a first member of the compounds, a noun, adjective or verb was used, and as the second member for the rest material, a voiceless/voiced noun was used. Only noun-noun compounds had voiceless and voiced conditions.

　The results showed that there was a difference in the age at which the children acquired the of ability for the combination and division tasks. In the combination task, the mean correct score of 4th grade children was over 90%. On the other hand, in the division task, the score of even the 5th grade children did not reach 90%. Both the HH and NH children showed a poorer score in the adjective/verb-noun condition as compared to that in the noun-noun condition.

　We wish to emphasize the importance of adequate vocabulary training for children with hearing impairment, to improve the comprehension and use of compound words.