Judith R. Johnston

Syntactic bootstrapping in children with specific language impairment

Syntactic bootstrapping was assessed in six children with normally developing language (NL) and six children with specific language impairment (SLI), ages 6 and 8, respectively. Children earned normal range non-verbal IQs and were matched by raw scores on a test of sentence comprehension. They were asked to listen to sentences containing novel verbs and to act out the meanings with toys. The SLI children earned reliably lower scores, but their errors suggested processing limitations rather than deficits in syntactic representation.

Development and Preliminary Evaluation of the Transsexual Voice Questionnaire for Male-to-Female Transsexuals

OBJECTIVE This study reports on the preliminary psychometric evaluation of the Transsexual Voice Questionnaire for Male-to-Female Transsexuals (MtF)-TVQ(MtF), a tool designed to measure the perceptions of MtF transsexuals regarding their voice. The TVQ(MtF) evolved from an extensive review of the existing Transgender Self-evaluation Questionnaire (TSEQ). STUDY DESIGN This study was conducted in two phases. In phase I, the TSEQ was reviewed. In phase II, classical test theory was applied to examine two psychometric properties (internal consistency and test-retest reliability) of the TVQ(MtF). METHOD In phase I, two speech pathologists and two MtF individuals reviewed the TSEQ, and a comparison was made with the results of a thematic analysis of 137 voice-related extracts from the transcripts of in-depth interviews with 14 MtF individuals. In phase II, 29 Australian and six Canadian MtF transsexuals completed the new tool, the TVQ(MtF) twice with an interim period of 4-6 weeks to enable psychometric evaluation. RESULTS Phase I led to substantial changes to the content and structure of the original measure, the TSEQ, and the subsequent development of the TVQ(MtF). In phase II, internal consistency of the TVQ(MtF) was found to be high (time 1 Cronbachs α=.964; time 2 α=.974). Excellent test-retest reliability was demonstrated (intraclass correlation coefficient=0.979; 95% confidence interval=0.968-0.988). CONCLUSIONS This study provides psychometric evidence of the reliability of the TVQ(MtF). The MtF participants in this study reported a wide range of vocal functioning and voice-related difficulties. Voice pitch was reported as the most problematic aspect of vocal functioning, and psychosocial issues were the most frequently reported voice-related impacts.

Grammatical morphology in language–impaired children acquiring English or German as their first language: A functional perspective

Fourteen matched pairs of German-speaking and English-speaking language-impaired children, aged 4;5–6;11, were tested for their knowledge of grammatical morphology and expressive vocabulary, using the Grammatical Closure subtest of the ITPA or its German adaptation, Grammatik in the PET, and the Expressive One-Word Picture Vocabulary Test or the Aktiver Wortschatztest. Children were matched pairwise on the basis of their chronological age, nonverbal IQ, and scores in a sentence imitation and a sentence production task. As predicted, the German-speaking language-impaired children earned higher scores in grammatical morphology and vocabulary than did the English-speaking children. These findings add to a growing body of literature that documents language-specific sensitivity to particular sorts of syntactic devices. They also suggest that the morphological difficulties seen in English-speaking language-impaired children stem in part from the minor functional role played by these forms during the early language learning years.

Use of cognitive state predicates by language-impaired children.

Two studies of the use of cognitive state predicates by children with specific language impairment (SLI) were conducted. Study I analysed longitudinal language samples collected from 26 children with SLI and 25 children with normal language (NL) development, aged 4;4 and 2;11, respectively, at Time I. Study II analysed samples from SLI children with more severe delays at an earlier language stage. There were 10 SLI children and 10 NL children, aged 4;11 and 2;8, respectively, matched by MLU. All cognitive state predicates were identified using both broad and narrow definitions. In Study 1, the SLI children used cognitive state predicates less frequently than their mental age peers, and with no greater frequency or variety than their younger, language peers. In Study II, children with SLI used more predicates referring to communication events, but there were no further group differences. These findings are discussed as they relate to two current psycholinguistic issues: the possible dissociation of grammar and the lexicon, and the role of language in the development of childrens theory of mind.

Cognitive Scripts in Autistic Children and Adolescents

People normally rely on cognitive scripts to structure social interaction. As the dysfunctional social behavior of people with autism extends to situations that are commonly scripted, one wonders whether a partial explantion might be either absent or deficient scriptal representations. Twenty-four relatively high-functioning subjects with autism were compared to typically developing children who had been selected to be similar to the autistic subjects in terms of nonverbal mental age and language level. All subjects were presented with a series of three tasks designed to assess the presence of cognitive social scripts. Results indicated that basic scriptal knowledge was intact but that reliable differences in expressive language persisted.

Cognitive development in pre-adolescent language impaired children.

This study investigates conceptual development in seven pre-adolescent language impaired children with normal range performance IQ. Across a variety of Piagetian tasks these children performed less well than would be expected for their mental age. This was particularly true for tasks demanding anticipatory imagery. These findings suggest that language impairment may be accompanied by pervasive cognitive deficits—including difficulties with non-linguistic symbolic representation.

Expressions of Past Time by Normal Language Impaired Children.

This study investigated possible developmental asynchrony in children with specific language impairment (SL1). This was accomplished by comparing the development of temporal expressions of past reference in two linguistic domains. Verb tense and temporal adverbs served as representatives of the morphological and lexical domains. A cross-sectional design was used with four groups of subjects ( N = 48) from 3 to 5 years old. Three groups had normal language and one group had impaired language. Results indicated that the performances of SLI children were similar to those of their 3-year-old language peers on the verb tasks and similar to the 4-year-olds on the adverb tasks. Such differential delays provide direct experimental evidence for asynchronous language development in SLI children.

Cross‐cultural differences in beliefs and practices that affect the language spoken to children: mothers with Indian and Western heritage

BACKGROUND Speech-language pathologists often advise families about interaction patterns that will facilitate language learning. This advice is typically based on research with North American families of European heritage and may not be culturally suited for non-Western families. AIMS The goal of the project was to identify differences in the beliefs and practices of Indian and Euro-Canadian mothers that would affect patterns of talk to children. METHODS & PROCEDURES A total of 47 Indian mothers and 51 Euro-Canadian mothers of preschool age children completed a written survey concerning child-rearing practices and beliefs, especially those about talk to children. OUTCOMES & RESULTS Discriminant analyses indicated clear cross-cultural differences and produced functions that could predict group membership with a 96% accuracy rate. Items contributing most to these functions concerned the importance of family, perceptions of language learning, childrens use of language in family and society, and interactions surrounding text. CONCLUSIONS Speech-language pathologists who wish to adapt their services for families of Indian heritage should remember the centrality of the family, the likelihood that there will be less emphasis on early independence and achievement, and the preference for direct instruction.

The Continuing Relevance of CauseA Reply to Leonard’s Specific Language Impairment as a Clinical Category

Leonard proposes that many language-impaired children simply represent the low end of the normal distribution of language ability, and further, that this fact has significant research implications....

Thinking out loud: an exploration of problem-solving language in preschoolers with and without language impairment.

This study investigates the use of language while engaged in solving a complex spatial problem. Children with specific language impairment (SLI) have been reported to lag behind age peers in certain cognitive tasks, despite normal range non-verbal intelligence test scores. It was hypothesized that these delays could reflect some failure to employ language to direct and facilitate thought. Dyads of preschool children were taped during a three-dimensional construction task. Task-relevant utterances were then coded for function and addressee. The speech of six children with SLI, aged 4;10, was compared with that of two control groups, one matched by age, the other by language level. The SLI group used less problem-solving speech and fewer modal expressions than their age peers. Not all differences were statistically significant, but the pattern of findings indicated that what differences did occur were due to overall reductions in the amount of speech rather than any specific failure to use language as a tool of thought. Correlations between the use of problem-solving speech and a measure of cognitive style indicated clear group differences. For children in the control groups, greater use of private speech was associated with greater cognitive efficiency; for children in the SLI group the relationship was in the opposite direction, greater use of private speech being associated with less cognitive efficiency. In all three groups, problem-solving speech could be addressed either to partner or to self, although some individual preferences were observed. The findings, while preliminary, suggest new directions for studies of cognitive deficits in children with SLI. They also indicate the importance of including socially directed utterances, and controls for language proficiency, in future research on private speech.