The role of prosodic sensitivity in children's reading development

While the critical importance of phonological awareness (segmental phonology) to reading ability is well established, the potential role of prosody (suprasegmental phonology) in reading development has only recently been explored. This study examined the relationship between children's prosodic skills and reading ability. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses examined the unique contribution of word-level and phrase-level prosodic skills to the prediction of three concurrent measures of reading ability in 81 fourth-grade children (mean age 9.3 years). After controlling for phonological awareness and general rhythmic sensitivity, children's prosodic skills predicted unique variation in word-reading accuracy and in reading comprehension. Phrase-level prosodic skills, assessed by means of a reiterative speech task, predicted unique variance in reading comprehension, after controlling for word reading accuracy, phonological awareness and general rhythmic sensitivity. These results add to the growing body of evidence of the importance of prosodic skills in reading development.