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Please do not distribute or quote. Comments welcome. Abstract The purpose of this tutorial is to underscore the importance of the link between lexical and phonological acquisition by considering learning by children beyond the 50-word stage and by applying cognitive models of spoken word processing to development. Lexical and phonological variables that have been shown to influence perception and production across the lifespan are considered relative to their potential role in learning by preschool children. The effect of these lexical and phonological variables on perception, production, and learning are discussed in the context of a two-representation connectionist model of spoken word processing. The model appears to offer insights into the complex interaction between the lexicon and phonology and may be useful for clinical diagnosis and treatment of children with functional phonological delays. To acquire the native language, a child must do two things: learn the words of the language and extract the relevant phonological characteristics of these words. For the most part, acquisition of words and sounds has been investigated independently. That is, some lines of investigation concentrate exclusively on how the words of the language are acquired (e. whereas other separate lines of research examine how the sounds of the language emerge Stoel-Gammon, 1985). The mutual influence of lexical and phonological development is an area that has received only limited attention. The few descriptive and experimental studies that have addressed this issue, however, provide preliminary evidence for an interaction between lexical and phonological development. Descriptive studies primarily have examined the relationship between the phonological characteristics of babble and first words. Studies of typically developing children have shown that first words are phonologically similar to babble 1985). For example, the distribution of consonants and the syllable structure of first words are identical to that of babble (Vihman et al., 1985). This association between lexical and phonological development is observed in children with precocious language development as well as those with know many words tend to produce a greater variety of sounds and sound combinations; whereas, children who know few words tend to produce a limited variety of sounds and sound combinations. There appears to be a potentially robust relationship between the phonological characteristics of first The Lexicon and Phonology 4 words and babble. This is suggestive of an intimate connection between word learning and productive phonology. In addition to descriptive evidence, experimental studies provide further support for the hypothesis that …