Speech Therapy

Glossary

An informed decision leads to better results. We've compiled the most common terms related to speech therapy.

A

hypertrophied adenoids
Increased growth of adenoid tissue that can obstruct the nasal passages, promoting mouth breathing, snoring, and myofunctional disorders. After medical or surgical treatment, breathing, chewing, and swallowing are retrained.
Aphasia
Acquired language disorder, frequently occurring after stroke or trauma, that affects understanding, speaking, reading, or writing. Intervention aims to restore linguistic functions and communication strategies.
Aphonia
Total loss of voice due to vocal abuse, inflammation, vocal fold injury, or psychogenic factors. Requires medical evaluation and targeted vocal therapy.
Childhood obstructive sleep apnea
Sleep-disordered breathing due to upper airway obstruction. It is associated with mouth breathing and craniofacial abnormalities. Myofunctional therapy complements the medical approach.
Apraxia of speech
Deficit in the planning and coordination of joint movements, with intact musculature. May occur during development or after neurological injury. Intensive motor training and structured repetition.
Articulation
Speech sounds are produced through coordinated movements of the tongue, lips, jaw, and palate. Alterations result in substitutions, omissions, or distortions.
Compensatory articulation
An alternative pattern used to overcome structural limitations, typical in cleft lip and palate. The intervention replaces compensations with correct points and modes.
Language delay
Slower rate of language development than expected for age. Requires ruling out auditory, environmental, and neurodevelopmental factors.
Autism (Autism Spectrum Disorder)
A neurodevelopmental condition characterized by differences in social communication and behavioral patterns. Focus on functional, pragmatic communication and family support.

B

Babbling
Rhythmic and repetitive vocalizations in babies. Variety in babbling is associated with better later phonological development.

C

Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC)
Strategies and systems that complement or replace natural speech, whether low or high technology. The goal is functional communication and autonomy.
Phonological awareness
Ability to identify and manipulate rhymes, syllables, and phonemes. Strong predictor of reading and writing, frequent target of training.

D

Atypical swallowing
Pattern with tongue thrust, poor lip seal, or excessive use of perioral muscles. Related to malocclusions. Myofunctional rehabilitation.
Neonatal hearing screening
Early screening for hearing loss in the first weeks of life. Early detection and intervention improve language outcomes.
Oral diadochokinesia (DDK)
Measuring speed and coordination in rapid articulatory sequences. Useful in diagnosing motor speech disorders.
Dysarthria
Motor speech disorder due to weakness or poor coordination of the articulatory muscles. Speech may sound slurred, monotonous, or nasal.
Dysphagia
Difficulty swallowing solids and/or liquids with risk of choking and aspiration. Clinical and, when indicated, instrumental assessment, with a rehabilitation plan.
Dysphonia
Changes in vocal quality, including hoarseness, strain, or fatigue. Management includes vocal hygiene and voice retraining.
Disfluency
Involuntary interruptions in the flow of speech, such as repetitions, prolongations, and blocks. When persistent, they constitute stuttering.
Dysphemia (stuttering)
Fluency disorder. Intervention combines communication strategies, self-regulation, and reduction of communicative stress factors.
Dyslalia
Traditional term for articulatory errors without a neurological basis. Today it is classified as an articulatory or phonological disorder.
Dyslexia
Specific reading disorder characterized by difficulties in the accuracy and fluency of decoding, often linked to phonological deficits.

E

Echolalia
Immediate or delayed repetition of words or phrases. It can have a communicative function and can be developed for greater flexibility.
Early language stimulation
Responsive strategies for everyday use to promote vocabulary, syntax, and pragmatics, with dialogic reading and expansion of statements.
Stridor
Respiratory noise due to airway obstruction. Requires medical evaluation. Therapy is necessary when there is an impact on voice, feeding, or speech.

F

Cleft lip and palate
Malformation of the lip and/or palate affecting sucking, swallowing, resonance, and articulation. Interdisciplinary treatment with surgery and speech therapy.
Phoneme
The smallest distinctive sound unit in a language. Phonemic training supports reading and writing.
Phonetics
Physical and articulatory study of speech sounds. Basis for describing points and modes of articulation.
Phonology
Rules that organize sounds in language. The therapy works with contrasts and generalization of patterns.
Frenotomy
Procedure to release a short lingual frenulum when it has a functional impact on breastfeeding, speech, or oral hygiene.

G

Globalization
Production with excessive glottic closure. May arise as compensation in velopharyngeal insufficiency. Pneumophonoarticulatory coordination training.

H

Hypernasality
Excessive nasal resonance due to inefficient velopharyngeal closure. Treatment may include surgery and specific rehabilitation.
Hyponasality
Reduced nasal resonance, typical of nasal obstruction. Medical management and resonance training.
Hearing loss
Conductive, sensorineural, or mixed hearing loss. The impact on language depends on the degree, type, and age of onset. Hearing aids and early intervention improve prognosis.
Orofacial hypotonia
Reduced tone in the oral and facial muscles, influencing chewing, swallowing, and articulation. Myofunctional intervention focused on posture, sealing, and dissociation of movements.

I

Speech intelligibility
A measure of how understandable speech is to a listener. It improves with work on articulation, phonology, rhythm, and prosody.
Velopharyngeal insufficiency
Inability of the soft palate to close properly against the pharyngeal wall, resulting in nasal leakage and hypernasality. May require surgery, prosthetics, and therapy.

L

Lateralization of sounds
Airflow along the edges of the tongue, primarily affecting /s/ and /ʃ/. Point and manner of articulation are retrained.
Dialogic reading
Shared reading with open-ended questions, expansions, and joint attention for gains in vocabulary and comprehension.
Expressive language
Use of words, phrases, and gestures to communicate. Difficulties are evidenced by limited vocabulary and poorly organized speech.
Receptive language
Ability to understand what is said or read. Changes make it difficult to follow instructions and respond appropriately.

M

Unilateral chewing
Preferential use of one side for chewing, impacting myofunctional balance and occlusion. Intervention promotes symmetry and efficiency.
Phonological working memory
Temporary maintenance and manipulation of auditory information. Important for learning new words and reading. Practice is done with graduated tasks.
Minimum even numbers
Words that differ by a single phoneme. A central technique in phonological therapy for establishing contrasts.
Orofacial motor skills
This area is dedicated to breathing, chewing, swallowing, posture, and speech. It integrates specific exercises and training in a functional context.

N

Nasality
Resonant quality is assessed through the involvement of the nasal cavities. Extreme variations indicate a functional evaluation.
Vocal nodules
Bilateral benign thickening of the vocal folds due to vocal use/abuse. First line of treatment is vocal rehabilitation and vocal hygiene.
Nutrition with modified textures
Consistency adjustments for safety in dysphagia, prescribed after assessment with an associated rehabilitation plan.

O

Dental occlusion
Relationship between dental arches. Malocclusions are related to altered myofunctional patterns. Interdisciplinary approach with orthodontics.
Oropharynx
A segment of the pharynx relevant for the passage of food bolus and resonance. Structural and functional alterations impact swallowing and voice.
Serous otitis media
Fluid in the middle ear that reduces sound conduction, common in preschool children. It can affect speech and requires monitoring.

P

Palatoplasty
Surgery to correct a cleft palate. Improves velopharyngeal function and resonance, followed by rehabilitation.
Articulatory disorder
Incorrect production of one or more sounds without a neurological cause. Involves substitutions, omissions, or distortions.
Disruption of social (pragmatic) communication
Difficulty using language appropriately in social contexts, despite preserved vocabulary and grammar.
Language disorder
Persistent and significant alteration in linguistic comprehension and/or expression, with functional impact.
Specific language impairment (SLI)
Significant language difficulties without hearing, intellectual, or neurological deficits. One of the most frequent causes in childhood.
Phonological disorder
Difficulties in organizing and using speech sounds, affecting intelligibility. Rules and contrasts are worked on.
Pragmatics
Social use of language: initiating and maintaining conversations, interpreting implicit meanings, and adjusting register to context.
Prosody
Intonation, rhythm, and accentuation convey meaning and emotion. Practice improves natural communication.

R

Laryngopharyngeal reflux
Contact between gastric contents and the larynx and pharynx, causing hoarseness, throat clearing, and coughing. Medical management and vocal retraining are necessary.
Mouth breathing
Mouth breathing habit, associated with orofacial alterations and myofunctional patterns. Re-education of lip seal and tongue posture.
Rhinophonia / Rhinolalia
Terms for changes in nasal resonance. It is preferred to describe them as hypernasality or hyponasality depending on the function.

S

Hearing screening
A brief assessment to detect the risk of hearing loss at various ages and refer for a complete diagnosis.
Lip sealing
Keep lips closed at rest and during activity. Their absence is associated with mouth breathing and inefficient swallowing.
Warning signs of language
Age-related indicators that justify assessment, such as the absence of gestures at 12 months, of words at 16 months, or of combinations at 24 months.
Syllabication
Structuring words into syllables. Syllabic awareness is an important stage in phonological development.
Nasal blow
Audible air escaping through the nose during speech. This may indicate velopharyngeal dysfunction or improper articulatory habits.

T

Taquilalia
Rapid speech with loss of clarity. Intervention regulates rhythm, breathing, and articulation.
Stuttering
Synonymous with stuttering in some contexts. See also Dysphemia.
Evidence-based therapy
It integrates the best scientific studies, clinical experience, and the preferences of the individual and their family to inform therapeutic decisions.
Speech therapy
A healthcare profession that prevents, assesses, and treats disorders of communication, language, voice, fluency, and swallowing at all ages.
Myofunctional therapy
Rebalancing the orofacial muscles to optimize breathing, chewing, swallowing, and articulation.
Tympanostomy
Placement of ventilation tubes in the eardrum to ventilate the middle ear and reduce recurrent ear infections, with benefits for hearing.

V

Velopharynx, mechanism
The set of structures that separates the oral and nasal cavities during speech and swallowing. Velopharyngeal competence is essential for resonance and intraoral pressure.
Voice
Sound produced by the vocal cords and modified by the articulators, transmitting linguistic and emotional information.
Breathy voice
Vocal quality with excessive air escape, resulting in an airy voice. Training in respiratory support and efficient glottal closure.