RULES VERSUS ANALOGIES IN CHILDRENS SPELLING - EVIDENCE FOR TASK DEPENDENCE

Two experiments were conducted to investigate developmental changes in children's use of rime-level units of sound-to-spelling correspondenc e when spelling nonwords under varying task demands. In Experiment 1, nonwords were presented in isolation. Older children spelled more of t he nonwords by analogy than younger children. Experiment 2 adopted ver sions of the clue word technique employed by Goswami (1988a) and found that significantly more analogous, rime-based responses were given to the same stimuli in both younger and older children. However, fewer a nalogous responses were given when the salience of the clue word was r educed by presentation of multiple target nonwords. The results sugges t that while children in the early stages of development possess the a bility to use rime-based units in spelling, they do not always make sp ontaneous use of this analogy strategy. However, when the potential to use rime-based units is highlighted by task demands, as is the case i n Experiment 2 when a clue word is provided, even young children make considerable use of analogy in spelling.