It is with renewed appreciation for the size of the task that I come to writing the present
chapter. The number of special issues of journals dedicated to im/politeness these days …

This article reviews research on when acoustic‐phonetic variability facilitates, inhibits, or
does not impact perceptual development for spoken language, to illuminate mechanisms by …

The acoustic-phonetic realizations of words can vary dramatically depending on a variety of
within-and across-talker characteristics such as regional dialect, native language, age, and …

Efficient language use involves the capacity to flexibly adjust to varied pronunciations of
words. Although children can contend with some accent variability before their second …

How the world's 6,000+ natural languages have arisen is mostly unknown. Yet, new sign
languages have emerged recently among deaf people brought together in a community …

Substantial individual differences exist in regard to type and amount of experience with
variable speech resulting from foreign or regional accents. Whereas prior experience helps …

To learn the meaning of a new word, or to recognize the meaning of a known one, both
children and adults benefit from surrounding words, or the sentential context. Most of the …

To acquire language and successfully communicate in multicultural and multilingual
societies, children must learn to understand speakers with various accents and dialects. This …

A critical indicator of spoken language knowledge is the ability to discern the finest possible
distinctions that exist between words in a language—minimal pairs, for example, the …

Following the proposal by Nespor, Peña, and Mehler (2003) that consonants are more
important in constraining lexical access than vowels, New, Araújo, and Nazzi (2008) …