ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews the main experimental findings and theoretical positions on infants' acquisition of the native phoneme system. It discusses how speech perception and production evolve in the early stages of language development and how speech perception shows continuity with later word learning. Recent neurobiological evidence confirms that infants learn to recruit articulatory information during speech perception. Speech perception development can often be explained by acoustic salience and frequency; speech production development is well understood from articulatory development. The chapter introduces general developments in speech perception and production in the first year of life and presents the main theoretical views on the developmental relationship between perception, production and word learning. It examines the acquisition of particular contrasts in speech perception, speech production and word learning, and highlights the parallels in development across domains and discussing their potential interplay. The chapter concludes with avenues for future research.
