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This study examined the most frequent mechanisms in the creation of hypocoristics within spoken Panamanian Spanish. To this end, a sociolinguistic corpus was constructed, composed of 120 native speakers selected through non-probabilistic purposive sampling in different provinces of the country. The research employed a qualitative approach, using a sociolinguistic checklist followed by a descriptive categorical analysis based on thematic coding of phonological and morphological patterns, with the aim of identifying the processes present in everyday situations. The findings reveal the importance of syllable truncation, along with phenomena such as duplication, insertion of weak vowels, palatalization, and certain phonosyntactic processes (metathesis, interversion). These results show a combination of systematic procedures with affective nuances specific to the region, providing novel empirical evidence for the morphopragmatic study of Panamanian Spanish.
