midterm Flashcards
Most children with language impairments are not identified until what age?
2;0
In the absence of other significant disabilities, the first evidence for a language delay is:
The late onset of the production of first words
A slow development of vocabulary growth
Children who fail to meet linguistic milestones ( age appropriate first words and vocabulary) are referred to as:
late talkers
Characteristics of late talkers
Follow similar patterns & order of acquisition, however, phonological and semantic development is extended over a longer period of time
less vocal and verbal
less accurate in their consonantal production
smaller consonantal and vowel inventories
Restricted and less complex array of syllable structures
Babbling period is extended and less complex
Phonological processes persist over a longer period of time
Consonantal inventory for late talkers
Consonantal inventory consisting primarily of the voiced stops (/d/, /g/, /b/), nasals (/m/, /n/), and glides (/j/, /w/)
syllable structure of late talkers
Using predominantly single vowels and CV syllable shapes
At what age are morphosyncratic delays more prominent?
3;0
What can you use as a reliable predictor of the complexity of a child’s language?
MLU
Describe some morphosyntactic delays for late talkers
Delayed in syntactic complexity and morphological maturity based on MLU scores
Deficits are apparent on both noun and verb morphology
Nominal morphemes
Articles (the, a ) – “I want _ ball”
Pronouns (she, his) – “me want ball” ; “the boy, she happy”
Verbal morphemes
Verbal morphemes such as contractible copula (she’s a teacher) and auxiliary (he is swimming) being the most difficult
Chronic morphosyntactic deficits at the sentence level are apparent at what age for late talkers?
Chronic morphosyntactic deficits at the sentence level are apparent in the narratives of 4-year-old late talkers
content
semantics
form
phonology, morphology, & syntax
language use
pragmatics
Early difficulties in what is a good predictors of later academic skills?
Difficulties in content, form, and language use.
Measures of narrative skills
(cohesion, semantic content, lexical diversity, and syntax)
4-year-olds who were identified as late talkers at age 2, performed more poorly on…?
All measures of narrative skills.
Their narratives reflected their difficulties in encoding, organizing, and linking schemes, as well as retrieving precise and diverse words from their lexicons
Late talkers versus Late Bloomers
Many late talkers ‘catch up’ in expressive language skills by age 3;0 or 4;0
Late Bloomers
Late bloomers make progress in vocabulary development after their 2nd b-day and by their 3rd b-day look very similar to their typically developing peers in their expressive language skills
However, many toddlers with expressive language delays never really ‘catch up’ to their peers and continue to show persistent language delays even after the age of 3;0.
How to distinguish transient language difficulties (i.e., late bloomers) from persistent language impairments (i.e., late talkers)?
According to ASHA, while you really can never know there are several factors that may increase that a late talker’s language difficulties may persist.
Namely, their use of receptive language, use of gestures, age of diagnosis, and progress in language development.
Use of gestures: Late bloomers vs. late talkers
One study has found that the number of gestures used by late-talking children with comparably low expressive language can indicate later language abilities. Children with a greater number of gestures used for different communication purposes are more likely to catch up with peers. Such a result is supported by findings that some older children who are taught non-verbal communication systems show a spontaneous increase in oral communication.
Age of diagnosis: late talkers vs. late bloomers
More than one study has indicated that the older the child at time of diagnosis, the less positive the outcome. Obviously, older children in a study have had a longer time to bloom than younger children but have not done so, indicating that the language delay may be more serious. Also, if a child is only developing slowly during an age range when other children are rapidly progressing (e.g. 24-30 months) that child will be falling farther behind.
Gestures: late bloomers vs. late talkers
Late bloomers use more communicative gestures in order to compensate for their lack of words. In contrast, late talkers fail to show an increase in communicative gestures as a compensation for their verbal delay (Thal & Tobias, 1992).
Compensatory use of communicative gestures is a positive prognostic sign for later typical language development.
Can children who are late talkers “recover”?
A recovery rate of about 50% per year from age 2 to age 5 - 75 to 85% of the later talkers identified at age 2;0 recovered and scored within normal range at age 5;0
Several procedures can be used to assess the emerging language abilities of toddlers:
play based assessment communication-based assessment parent questionnaires comprehension assessment language sample
Play-based assessment
Provides information about the child’s skills in naturalistic, meaningful activities
Parents Questionnaires
Direct testing is expensive, time consuming, and often not representative of the child’s linguistic abilities due to child’s unwillingness to cooperate
Parents report is an efficient technique to assess toddlers’ language abilities without actually testing them
Parent report is based on extensive experience the parents have with their child over a long period time and across many situations and contexts.
It is less influenced by performance factors (e.g., fatigue, unfamiliar environment, etc.)
Comprehension Assessment
One of the predictors of later language development
One of the means to distinguish between late bloomers and late talkers
Very few standardized tests of receptive language for children under the age of 3.
Informal Comprehension Assessment Includes
Does the child understand single words without the support of nonlinguistic cues (e.g., visual cues)?
Does the child understand two-word combinations or semantic relations?
Does the child comprehend simple sentence form of agent-action-object (SVO)?
Does the child understand single words without the support of nonlinguistic cues (e.g., visual cues)?
A collection of several objects are placed in front of the child, and the SLP asks the child for each object using a simple sentence form as “give me ______” or “where is _______?” without using nonlinguistic cues such as pointing, or looking at directly at the object
To test for the comprehension of verbs, the SLP can provide the child with an object and ask the child to manipulate it, as in “throw it” or “kiss it”
Does the child understand two-word combinations or semantic relations?
The SLP can use the word-order rules (semantic-syntactic rules) children in the 2-word stage use to produce and understand multi-word combinations. For example, “throw ball” or “eat apple”.
Does the child comprehend simple sentence form of agent-action-object (SVO)?
The SLP can present several sentences to the child and asks the child to act them out, for example “show me….the baby eats the banana”.
Collecting a language sample
Spontaneous language sampling is a commonly used tool in clinical practice to assess the strengths and weaknesses in all language areas:
morphosyntax, phonology, semantics, pragmatics.
Morphosyntax
- examining the length and complexity of utterances and the use of grammatical morphemes
Collecting a language sample
Spontaneous language sampling is a commonly used tool in clinical practice to assess the strengths and weaknesses in all language areas:
morphosyntax, phonology, semantics, pragmatics.
Is usually collected while the child is engaged in a free play with the caregiver or SLP. Data is then transcribed and analyzed for the presence or absence of age appropriate linguistic forms
Children in the emerging language stage with slow language development are less talkative making the collecting of a language sample more difficult.
Semantics
– examining vocabulary size (nouns and verbs), lexical diversity
Pragmatics
- examining communicative intents, conversational skills.
. Two ways to overcome this obstacle: (Less talkative children are more difficult to get language sample from.
Parents’ diaries
Audio-taping the child at home or at the daycare
Audio-taping the child at home or at the daycare
times a child may be most vocal
interacting with siblings. bath times, lunch time, and other daily activities
