Misarticulation is a speech sound disorder in which a person shows difficulty in articulation and produces sounds, syllables, words incorrectly. This leads to difficulty in understanding speech.
Misarticulation can be due to following reasons-
- Developmental Disability
- Hearing Loss At Early Age
- Any structural and functional deformity in articulators (lips, teeth, tongue, buccal cavity, jaw,
palate) like cleft lip/palate, tongue tie. - Genetic disorder like Down Syndrome
- Neurological problem like cerebral palsy, dysarthria, apraxia of speech
- Low Education
- Mislearning
In articulation disorder following types of speech errors can be seen.
Substitution (swapping sounds in words; for example- saying ‘tat’ instead of ‘cat’).
Omission (omitting sounds from words; saying ‘baket’ instead of ‘basket’)
Addition ( Adding sounds in words; for example- saying ‘ischool’ instead of ‘school’)
Distortion ( distorting sounds; for example- saying ‘phis’ instead of ‘fish’)
Misarticulation can be treated by the Speech Therapist who assesses the person by using various assessment tools. After detailed diagnosis treatment plans are made. By following different therapeutic techniques and approaches it can be treated.
