PIP                     Phonological

                                                                                        Intervention

Project

Research Aims

    The Phonological Intervention Project was first initiated in 1990 with the development and investigation of a new model of phonological intervention:  Multiple Oppositions.  Sine the inception of PIP, speech and language screenings, diagnostic evaluations, and treatment services have been provided to over 200 children with speech disabilities.  The research program of PIP also serves as a clinical training practicum for graduate students in speech-language pathology.

    The Phonological Intervention Project at East Tennessee State University is a research program housed in the Department of Communicative Disorders with funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIDCD).  The goal of PIP is to examine disordered sound systems as unique, self-contained, and independent languages and to implement new intervention methods to facilitate restructuring of disordered sound systems.

    There are two primary aims of this research.  The first is to develop explanatory and descriptive assessment frameworks for children with speech disabilities.  In the assessment approach developed within PIP, the child’s entire sound system is described as an “exotic”, native language of its own.  Utilizing methodology and principles borrowed from linguistics, the systemic and structural aspects of the child’s own language are described and then mapped onto the adult language.  In this regard, English is viewed as the child’s second language. 

    The second aim of PIP is to implement intervention utilizing the multiple oppositions approach.  The primary hypothesis being investigated is that sound learning is facilitated through the manipulation of systemic and functional properties of the child’s sound system.  Evidence regarding changes in children’s sound systems include detailed phonological descriptions and learning patterns.

    The results from the projects conducted through PIP have theoretical and clinical implications.  Theoretically, the results address the organization and symmetry of disordered sound systems, the learnability of larger treatment sets and their impact on phonological restructuring, and the convergence of systemic and functional properties in sound learning.  Clinically, more efficient models of assessment and treatment of significant speech disabilities are determined.