Modification of consonant speech-sound articulation in young children.

A series of three experiments was performed in a classroom setting with small groups of young children with severe articulation problems. Variations on a basic token reinforcement procedure were demonstrated in each experiment. A combined multiple baseline/reversal design showed effective experimenter control of rates of correct and incorrect consonant sound articulation in all cases. In addition, the data in each experiment showed the problems of obtaining stimulus generalization of the high rates of correct articulation to non-training settings. The third experiment demonstrated a procedure for producing such generalization by making each child a discriminative stimulus for correct articulaton by the other child, thus maintaining high levels of correct articulation for each child when in the presence of the other.