ABSTRACT
The most prevailing hypothesis regarding mechanisms behind specific language impairment today is the hypothesis of general limitations of processing capacity. Such an hypothesis can hardly be tested by available language assessment tools, especially not by instruments in use for clinical assessment of the lexical-semantic domain in children. Reduced naming speed is by some researchers considered as a core deficit in dyslexia and a better predictor of some aspects of reading proficiency than phonological processing. The overall purpose of the present study was therefore to develop a processing dependent tool, that could capture dynamic aspects of naming; response latencies, hesitation phenomena and contextual influence. We also present data from 30 children (4-6 years old) with normal language development. We believe that, with some modifications, the naming test has a potential of becoming a processing dependent measure of naming and a necessary complement to the assessment of vocabulary skills in children with language impairment.
Subject(s)
Diagnosis, Computer-Assisted , Language Disorders/diagnosis , Vocabulary , Child, Preschool , Female , Humans , Language Disorders/epidemiology , Male , SemanticsABSTRACT
Specific language impairment has, although not without controversy, been considered as a consequence of a phonological memory deficit. Non-word repetition has been proposed as a reliable index of phonological memory and also as predictive of lexical and grammatical development in normally developing and language-impaired children. The main aim was to study the relationship between repetition of words and non-words and expressive language skills (phonology and grammar) in 27 5-year-old children with language impairment. The authors also wanted to explore the influence of lexical stress on repetition skills. The results showed that words were significantly easier to repeat than non-words and that non-word repetition skills were significantly correlated to phonological and grammatical development. The most important predictor of non-word repetition skills was output phonology. The conclusion is that non-word repetition is not a single, reliable index of phonological memory in preschool children with language impairment. Also, the influence of prosodic variables on segmental aspects of speech production should not be overlooked in non-word construction, since it was found that unstressed syllables were omitted six times more often in prestressed than in post-stressed positions of the words and non-words.
