The results are the strongest case ever documented of an iconic correspondence between speech sounds and properties related to our senses of touch and vision.

The results have implications for efforts to help children with hearing loss surmount initial language delays caused by a lack of auditory input and access to speech sounds before they receive cochlear implants.

They might say “one, two, three” or “one, one, one” where the number of speech sounds corresponds to the number of apples they see.

With their technology, the investigators showed that it's possible to reliably determine the speech sounds that individuals will say before they articulate them.

Finally, children were asked to match words based on whether they began or ended with the same speech sound, a task essential not only to speech development but also to reading acquisition.