Which statement about Consistent/Persistent Phonological Disorder is true?

• A. Consistent/Persistent phonological disorder is non-developmental and idiosyncratic with little spontaneous improvement.
• B. Inconsistent phonological disorder shows stable production across repeated trials.
• C. Phonological systems with variability of production on the same item cannot be considered disorders.
• D. Articulation disorder is the same as phonological disorder.

Answer: (A)

Consistent/persistent phonological disorder describes a stable set of speech sound errors that remains across different words and contexts and does not align with typical developmental milestones. Because these patterns are entrenched and appear unique to the child, there is little spontaneous improvement over time without targeted therapy. The other ideas don’t fit: an inconsistent phonological disorder involves variability in productions, not stable patterns, so saying it shows stable production is incorrect. Varied productions on the same item can still occur in a disorder, so variability doesn’t rule out a phonological issue. And articulation disorder is about motor errors producing individual sounds, not the broader, patterned sound-system issues that define phonological disorders.