Lexical Semantic Knowledge of Children with ASD—a Review Study

Studies on the lexical semantic abilities of children with autism have yielded contradicting results. The aim of the current review was to explore studies that have specifically focused on the lexical semantic abilities of children with ASD and try to find an explanation for these contradictions. In the 32 studies reviewed, no single factor was found to affect lexical semantic skills, although children with broader linguistic impairment generally, but not universally, also showed impaired lexical semantic skills. The need for future studies with young ASD participants, with differing intellectual functioning, longitudinal studies, and studies assessing a wide range of language domains are discussed.

The development of semantic reading among students of a defectological profile in the digitalization of education

The study of psychological and pedagogical conditions, and the formation of professionally significant qualities of the future speech therapist, is associated with the formation of intonational and semantic skills, which affects the training of future specialists. The presented forms, methods of organizing the educational process on the example of specific subjects of the educational plan, made it possible to increase the competence of students. Specially selected exercises during the "Pedagogy" discipline were focused on mastering the scientific style, which contributed to the development of semantic reading. The results of the work done confirm that if specially selected tasks are included in the educational process, this allows for better training of future speech therapists in accordance with the standard of professional training in the context of digitalization.

Psychological Determinants of Meta-Linguistic Skills by Pre-School Children

The paper concerns psycholinguistic phenomena connected with meta-language, meta-linguistic awareness and children’s semantic skills. The main aim of empirical activities was to analyze psychological and linguistic conditionings of acquiring the meanings of words by 4- and 6-year-old children. It was examined how children understand the meaning of words from two categories: home and family. The analyses and conclusions on the creation of meaning presented in the paper are focused around the symbiosis of two planes: cognitive and linguistic. An analysis of the collected empirical material shows that their compilation reveals the unique nature of children’s meta-language reflection, the character of concepts and notion profiles which are closely determined by mental processes.

Using Language-Specific and Bilingual Measures to Explore Lexical–Grammatical Links in Young Latino Dual-Language Learners

Purpose This study examined the nature of the relation between language-specific vocabulary and conceptual lexical–semantic skills with grammatical abilities within and across languages in preschool Latino dual language learners (DLLs). Method Sixty-one typically developing, Spanish–English speaking DLLs from preschools serving low-income families participated in the study. Lexical, semantic, and grammar skills were assessed toward the end of the fall in both Spanish and English using normative and researcher-developed assessment instruments. Hierarchical linear regressions using baseline cross-sectional data were completed to determine the association of language-specific vocabulary and bilingual lexical and semantic abilities to grammatical skills measured by sentence repetition tasks in Spanish and English both within and across languages. Results Results from the study revealed that a considerable percentage of the variance in the grammatical ability of these Latino DLL preschoolers in both Spanish and English was explained by lexical variables in the same language (54% in English and 16% in Spanish). In the strong language (Spanish), bilingual semantic skills also played a role, explaining an additional 8% of the variance. Conceptual vocabulary was a significant predictor of English grammar in the model that excluded the language-specific vocabulary measures. Conclusions These findings suggest that grammatical skills in the Latino preschoolers examined in the study are strongly related to language-specific measures of vocabulary. In contrast, no evidence supporting the relation between vocabulary and grammar skills across languages was observed. Findings from this study provide insight into the impact of bilingual lexical–semantic knowledge on the grammatical skills of dual-language preschool children developing language abilities in their 2 languages. Clinical implications are also discussed.

Rehabilitation of lexical and semantic communicative impairments: An overview of available approaches

Lexical-semantic impairments are common consequences of acquired neurological damage. However, little is known about the benefits of existing treatment methods for this type of language impairment.OBJECTIVE: To evaluate current research into lexical-semantic interventions for adults with dementia, TBI or stroke.METHODS: The PubMed, PsycInfo and SCOPUS databases were searched for studies related to rehabilitation, neurological conditions, communicative and lexical-semantic skills published between 2004 and 2014.RESULTS: Twenty-eight of the 453 abstracts found were selected for the review based on the PRISMA method. Most of the studies described treatments for anomia. Semantic tasks were the most commonly used, followed by phonological and gestural strategies. Interventions were individual and involved formal tasks, although the number, frequency and duration of sessions varied between studies.CONCLUSION: Although lexical-semantic interventions lead to improvements in language abilities, they are still poorly described in the literature, and must be further investigated in terms of their efficacy, effectiveness and long-term effects.

Lexical-semantic skills in bilingual children who are becoming English-dominant: A longitudinal study

Twenty-seven Mandarin–English bilingual children participated in picture identification and picture naming tasks at two time points, 16 months apart. The younger children (mean age = 4 years) showed greater gains over time than the older children (mean age = 6 years 10 months) in English lexical-semantic skills and neither group showed significant gains in Mandarin. At the individual level, a majority of the children showed increased accuracy for the English tasks, but only half of them did so for the Mandarin tasks. Analyses of error distribution indicated production of more advanced error types in the older children and in English, as well as different patterns of time-related changes in error types in the two languages. These findings illustrate how age and initial language proficiency are related to lexical growth among Mandarin-speaking bilingual children who are becoming English-dominant.