Presidential Postodoctoral Research Fellow in Linguistics Felix Kpogo recently attended the Association of Contemporary African Linguistics' (ACAL) 57th Annual Meeting, where he presented his paper titled "Bilingual Experience Shapes Coarticulation in Ga Complex-Simplex Contrast in Children." His work showed that both Ga-dominant and balanced Ga-English children robustly maintain the contrast between labio-velars (/kp, gb/) and plain labials (/p, b/). However, the two groups differed systematically in how they distributed acoustic information across dimensions, suggesting that language dominance influences phonetic implementation, but not acquisition of the contrast.

Kpogo also presented a poster at the International Child Phonology Conference's (ICPC) 47th Meeting. His work, titled "Covert Contrast and Acoustic Convergence in Child Ga Labio-velar Simplification.", demonstrated that when producing complex speech sounds such as /kp/ and /gb/, 5-year-old Ga-speaking children favor more stable motor plans that are easier to execute, even when those productions are less acoustically faithful to adult targets. He argues that these simplification patterns are consistent with developmental phonological models such as the A(rticulatory)-Map model.