Specific Language Impairment: Preliminary Investigation of Factors Associated With Family History and With Patterns of Language Performance

1995 ◽  
Vol 38 (3) ◽  
pp. 643-657 ◽  
Author(s):  
Margaret Lahey ◽  
Jan Edwards
Keyword(s):  
Family History ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Language Impairment ◽  
Specific Language Impairment ◽  
Preliminary Investigation ◽  
Family Members ◽  
Receptive Language ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Language Performance ◽  
Specific Language

To examine patterns that might suggest etiologic subgroups of specific language impairment (SLI), information, including history of speech-language-learning (SLLD) problems in family members, was obtained on 53 children with SLI aged 4 to 9½ years. The results led to the generation of a number of hypotheses for future research. In particular, the findings suggested that family history is related to pattern of language performance. In comparison with children who had both expressive and receptive language deficits, children with deficits in only expressive language had a higher proportion of affected family members (.47 vs. .22), of affected mothers (.57 vs. .17), and of affected siblings (.53 vs. .27). These and other findings are discussed in terms of their consistency with other data, hypotheses relative to explanations of SLI, and their implications for further research.

The impact of specific language impairment on performance in science and suggested implications for pedagogy

2011 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-37 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gill Matson ◽  
Tony Cline
Keyword(s):  
Language Impairment ◽  
Specific Language Impairment ◽  
Scientific Reasoning ◽  
Expressive Language ◽  
National Curriculum ◽  
Preliminary Investigation ◽  
Receptive Language ◽  
Specific Language ◽  
And Control ◽  
The Impact

The impact of specific language impairment (SLI) on the acquisition of literacy and numeracy skills has been well researched. In contrast little has been written on its impact on the third core subject in the National Curriculum (NC) of science and this article describes a preliminary investigation into the scientific reasoning skills of children with SLI in comparison with those of typically developing (TD) children. In individual assessment sessions 11 pairs of target children with SLI and control TD children in the Key Stage (KS) 2 age span (ages 7–11 years) undertook a series of scientific reasoning tasks appropriate to their age involving receptive and expressive language skills. The children with SLI had for the most part significantly more difficulty with expressive language tasks (ELTs) than the TD children, in spite of the provision of scaffolding, and there was some evidence that they also had greater difficulty with the production of causal connectives, e.g. because, so. However, there was no difference between the two groups on receptive language tasks (RLTs) when scaffolding was used. Some possible implications for pedagogy are considered in light of these findings, and problems in matching children with SLI and TD controls are discussed.

Why Do Children With Specific Language Impairment Name Pictures More Slowly Than Their Peers?

1996 ◽  
Vol 39 (5) ◽  
pp. 1081-1098 ◽  
Author(s):  
Margaret Lahey ◽  
Jan Edwards
Keyword(s):  
Language Impairment ◽  
Specific Language Impairment ◽  
Receptive Language ◽  
Limiting Factor ◽  
Language Performance ◽  
Specific Language ◽  
Language Problems ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Rate Limiting

To examine the role of different cognitive processes in accounting for the slower naming times of children with specific language impairment (SLI) relative to peers with no language impairment (NLI), three tasks designed to stress different types of processing were administered: naming pictures with the signal to respond presented at various delay intervals, naming following different durations of exposure to identical and unrelated primes, and vocally responding to nonlinguistic stimuli. Children with SLI, aged 4 to 9.5 years, were significantly slower than their NLI age peers on naming and on responding to nonlinguistic stimuli, but the effect of delay interval before naming and of duration of prime exposure before naming was similar for both groups. Results suggested that speed of naming is related to the slower nonlinguistic response processing of children with SLI and not to speed of their linguistic or perceptual processing. To examine differences in processing that might relate to pattern of language performance we examined responses of two subgroups of SLI. The subgroup of children whose language problems involved expressive but not receptive skills was not significantly slower than their NLI peers. The children whose problems involved both expressive and receptive language were significantly slower, but this was influenced by age. Findings are discussed in terms of language performance, age, task variables, and a generalized rate-limiting factor.

Deficits in Explicit Language Problem Solving Rather Than in Implicit Learning in Specific Language Impairment: Evidence From Learning an Artificial Morphological Rule

2019 ◽  
Vol 62 (10) ◽  
pp. 3790-3807 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sara Ferman ◽  
Liat Kishon-Rabin ◽  
Hila Ganot-Budaga ◽  
Avi Karni
Keyword(s):  
Language Learning ◽  
Language Impairment ◽  
Specific Language Impairment ◽  
Explicit Knowledge ◽  
Procedural Memory ◽  
Procedural Learning ◽  
Specific Language ◽  
Language Problems ◽  
Morphological Rule ◽  
Semantic Distinction

Purpose The purpose of this study was to delineate differences between children with specific language impairment (SLI), typical age–matched (TAM) children, and typical younger (TY) children in learning and mastering an undisclosed artificial morphological rule (AMR) through exposure and usage. Method Twenty-six participants (eight 10-year-old children with SLI, 8 TAM children, and ten 8-year-old TY children) were trained to master an AMR across multiple training sessions. The AMR required a phonological transformation of verbs depending on a semantic distinction: whether the preceding noun was animate or inanimate. All participants practiced the application of the AMR to repeated and new (generalization) items, via judgment and production tasks. Results The children with SLI derived significantly less benefit from practice than their peers in learning most aspects of the AMR, even exhibiting smaller gains compared to the TY group in some aspects. Children with SLI benefited less than TAM and even TY children from training to judge and produce repeated items of the AMR. Nevertheless, despite a significant disadvantage in baseline performance, the rate at which they mastered the task-specific phonological regularities was as robust as that of their peers. On the other hand, like 8-year-olds, only half of the SLI group succeeded in uncovering the nature of the AMR and, consequently, in generalizing it to new items. Conclusions Children with SLI were able to learn language aspects that rely on implicit, procedural learning, but experienced difficulties in learning aspects that relied on the explicit uncovering of the semantic principle of the AMR. The results suggest that some of the difficulties experienced by children with SLI when learning a complex language regularity cannot be accounted for by a broad, language-related, procedural memory disability. Rather, a deficit—perhaps a developmental delay in the ability to recruit and solve language problems and establish explicit knowledge regarding a language task—can better explain their difficulties in language learning.

Dynamic Temporal Processing of Nonspeech Acoustic Information by Children With Specific Language Impairment

1996 ◽  
Vol 39 (3) ◽  
pp. 510-517 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jane C. Visto ◽  
Jerry L. Cranford ◽  
Rosalind Scudder
Keyword(s):  
Language Learning ◽  
Language Impairment ◽  
Specific Language Impairment ◽  
Precedence Effect ◽  
Complex Sound ◽  
Specific Language ◽  
Acoustic Information ◽  
Rapid Changes ◽  
Spectral Components ◽  
Normal Language

The present study investigated whether children with specific language impairment (SLI) differed from children with normal language learning in their ability to process binaural temporal information. The SLI group was matched with peers of the same chronological age, as well as peers with similar language age. All three subject groups were tested with measures of complex sound localization involving the precedence effect phenomenon. Subjects were required to track the apparent motion of a “moving” fused auditory image (FAI). Movement of the FAI was simulated by varying the delay incrementally between pairs of clicks presented, one each, from two matched loudspeakers placed on opposite sides of the child’s head. With this task, the SLI subjects’ performances were found to be similar to their language age-matched but chronologically younger peers. Both groups exhibited tracking skills that were statistically poorer than that of the chronologically age-matched group. Additional tests indicated this effect was not due to differences in motoric tracking abilities nor to the SLI subjects’ abilities to perceive small binaural time cues. Thus, children with SLI appear to be impaired in their ability to use binaural acoustic information in a dynamic ongoing fashion. The requirements for processing such nonlinguistic acoustic information in a “dynamic and ongoing” fashion may be similar to those involved in the ongoing processing of rapid changes in the temporal and spectral components of the speech chain.

Acquisition of verb meaning through syntactic cues: A comparison of children with autism, children with specific language impairment (SLI) and children with typical language development (TLD)

2007 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 411-423 ◽  
Author(s):  
CORY SHULMAN ◽  
AINAT GUBERMAN
Keyword(s):  
Language Development ◽  
Language Impairment ◽  
Specific Language Impairment ◽  
Word Meaning ◽  
Children With Autism ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Primary Language ◽  
Specific Language ◽  
Underlying Mechanisms ◽  
Syntactic Cues

The ability to extract meaning through the use of syntactic cues, adapted from Naigles' (1990) paradigm, was investigated in Hebrew-speaking children with autism, those with specific language impairment (SLI) and those with typical language development (TLD), in an attempt to shed light on similarities and differences between the two diagnostic categories, both defined by primary language deficits. Thirteen children with autism and 13 with SLI were matched on chronological age, level of language functioning and gender, and 13 children with TLD were matched to the children in the two clinical groups according to language level, as measured by the CELF-P. Children with autism and children with TLD learned novel words using the syntactical cues in the sentences in which they were presented, whereas children with SLI experienced more difficulty, learning only that which would be expected from chance according to the binomial test. Only 4 of the 13 children with SLI (31%) learned the new words, whereas 11 children with autism and 10 children with TLD learned the novel verb using syntactical cues from the sentence frame. The results are analyzed in terms of possible underlying mechanisms in language acquisition. Children with autism seem to rely on relatively intact syntactic abilities, while children with SLI seem to have marked impairment in using this mechanism in acquiring word meaning. Implications for future research and intervention with preschool children with primary language disorders are discussed.

Specific Language Impairment as a Clinical Category

1991 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 66-68 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurence B. Leonard
Keyword(s):  
Language Learning ◽  
Language Impairment ◽  
Specific Language Impairment ◽  
Language Ability ◽  
Central Mechanism ◽  
Alternative View ◽  
Specific Language ◽  
Language Impaired ◽  
Language Measures ◽  
Clinical Category

Many children are diagnosed as "specifically language-impaired" principally on the basis of their low scores relative to the norm on language measures. Yet it is often assumed that such children must suffer from a subtle disruption or defect in some peripheral or central mechanism that is involved in language learning. In this paper, an alternative view is offered: Many of these children may simply be limited in language ability in much the same way that others may be poor in musical, spatial, or bodily kinesthetic abilities.

A Preliminary Investigation of Reduplication in Children with Specific Language Impairment

1985 ◽  
Vol 50 (2) ◽  
pp. 186-194 ◽  
Author(s):  
Margaret Lahey ◽  
Judy Flax ◽  
Gloria Schlisselberg
Keyword(s):  
Preschool Children ◽  
Language Development ◽  
Language Impairment ◽  
Specific Language Impairment ◽  
Preliminary Investigation ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Single Word ◽  
Specific Language ◽  
Whole Word

The frequency of reduplication was examined in relation to syllable maintenance, final consonant production, and whole word repetitions in two preschool children with specific language impairment—one who reduplicated frequently and one who did so infrequently. Spontaneous speech was sampled for a period of 18 months. During the single-word utterance period, reduplication was associated with infrequent production of final consonants but frequent maintenance of multisyllabic structure. After the single-word utterance period the child who had frequently reduplicated during this period ceased reduplication but frequently produced whole word repetitions. Infrequent production of final consonants continued, but syllable maintenance decreased. The data are discussed in relation to hypotheses about the function of reduplication and the function of whole word repetitions in language development.

Pragmatics and SLI

1993 ◽  
Vol 36 (4) ◽  
pp. 777-789 ◽  
Author(s):  
Holly K. Craig ◽  
Julia L. Evans
Keyword(s):  
Language Impairment ◽  
Specific Language Impairment ◽  
Language Skills ◽  
Receptive Language ◽  
Chronological Age ◽  
Specific Language ◽  
Language Status ◽  
Pragmatic Research ◽  
Normal Language ◽  
Mean Length Of Utterance

Selected discourse behaviors of children with specific language impairment (SU) presenting expressive (E:SLI) or combined expressive-receptive deficits (E-R:SLI) were compared to each other and to chronological age-mates and younger mean length of utterance (MLU)-matched children with normal-language skills. The two SLI subgroups varied from each other on specific measures of tum-taking and cohesion. These findings imply the need for future normative work with SLI subgroups differing in receptive skill, and indicate that, in the interim, pragmatic research with this population will need to consider potential effects of receptive language status when interpreting variations in outcomes for discourse-based variables.

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