Phonological process Description Example Approximate age of elimination Cluster reduction When a consonant cluster is “truck” à “tuck” ~4 years; produced with only one “slide” à “side” Including /s/, consonant “brown” à “bown” gone by 5 years Final consonant deletion When the last consonant of a “dog” à “daw” ~3 years word is omitted Initial consonant deletion When the first consonant of a “dog” à “awg” Never typical; word is omitted seen in more severe phonological disorders Weak syllable deletion When the first unstressed “banana” à “nana” ~4 years syllable of a word is omitted Epenthesis When a sound is added “plane” à “puh-lane” ~8 years between two consonants, often “uh” Backing When alveolar sounds /t/ or /d/ “bus” à “buhk” Never typical; are substituted with /k/ or /g/ “lid” à “lig” seen in more severe phonological disorders Fronting When velar sounds /k/ or /g/ are “bag” à “bad” ~3.5 years substitued with alveolar “lake” à “late” sounds /t/ or /d/ Affrication When a non-affricate is “doggie” à “joggie” ~3 years substitued with an affricate, “ch” or “j” Deaffrication When an affricate “ch” or “j” is “choo-choo” à “shoo shoo” ~4 years substituted with a fricative or “chip” à “dip” stop, like “sh” or /d/ Alveolarization When an non-alveolar sound is “shoe” à “tu” ~5 years substitued with an alveolar “make” à “nake” sound Depalatalization When a palatal sound is “dish” à “dit” ~5 years substituted with a non-palatal sound Labialization When a non-labial sound is “toad” à “poad” ~6 years substituted with a labial sound, “nail” à “mail” /m/, /p/, or /b/. Gliding When /l/ or /r/ becomes a /w/ or “yellow” à “yewo”or “yeyo” ~6 years /y/ sound “rock” à “wock” Stopping When a fricative or affricate is “foot” à “put” /f, v, s, z/ by 3 replaced with a stop “jump” à “dump” years “ch” “sh” “th” “j” by 5 years Vowelization When /l/ or “er” sounds are “apple” à “appo” -- replaced with a vowel “color” à “colluh” Assimilation When a consonant is “ladder” à “dadder” ~3 years substituted with another “bub” à “bus” consonant within the word Denasalization When a nasal consonant like /n/ “monkey” à “bunkey” ~2.5 years or /m/ is substituted with a non- “nose” à “dose” nasal sound like /d/ or /b/ Final Consonant Devoicing When a voiced consonant at “bug” à “buck” ~3 years the end of the word, like /d/ is “road” à “wrote” produced as its unvoiced counterpart, like /t/ Prevocalic Voicing When an unvoiced consonant “fish” à “vish” ~6 years at the beginning of the word, “sip” à “zip” like /f/, is produced as its voiced counterpart, like /v/ Coalescence When two phonemes are “spoon” à “foon” -- substituted with a consonant that has similar features Reduplication When a sound or incomplete “bottle” à “baba” ~3 years syllable is repeated .