Only in Páez 34
What this means for learners
Páez and Selepet share 15 sounds — roughly 31% of Selepet's inventory overlaps with Páez. Shared sounds are ones a speaker already knows from their native language and will generally produce and perceive accurately without explicit training.
The 6 sounds found only in Selepet represent the greatest pronunciation challenge for Páez speakers. The adult brain tends to map unfamiliar sounds onto the closest native equivalent — a process that produces the characteristic "accent" of a second-language speaker. Learning to hear and produce these sounds as distinct requires focused ear training, not just repetition.
Conversely, Páez has 34 sounds not used in Selepet. Native Selepet speakers learning Páez will face the mirror-image challenge with these sounds.
Phoneme inventories from PHOIBLE. Data reflects one documented inventory per language; some variation exists across dialects and sources.