Nicola Botting

Psycholinguistic Markers for Specific Language Impairment (SLI)

In this study 160 children, aged 11 years with a definite history of specific language impairment (SLI), completed four tasks that could be potential positive psycholinguistic markers for this impairment: a third person singular task, a past tense task, a nonword repetition task, and a sentence repetition task. This allowed examination of more than one type of marker simultaneously, facilitating both comparisons between markers and also evaluation of combinations of markers in relation to identifying SLI. The study also provided data regarding the markers in relation to nonverbal IQ, made use of new normative data on all tasks, and examined marker accuracy in relation to current language status. The results show that markers vary in accuracy, with sentence repetition (a previously unused marker) proving to be the most useful. This psycholinguistic marker shows high levels of sensitivity (90%), specificity (85%), and overall accuracy (88%), as well as being able to identify the majority of children whose current language status falls in the normal range despite a history of SLI.

Cognitive and educational outcome of very‐low‐birthweight children in early adolescence

A cohort of 138 very‐low‐birthweight (VLBW) 12‐year‐old children and matched control children were assessed on objective cognitive and educational measures. School performance was rated by teachers and by the children themselves. VLBW children were shown to have lower IQ scores, and poorer scores on all objective educational measures compared with control children. Controlling for IQ differences, mathematics and reading‐comprehension scores remained significantly lower for VLBW children. Teachers rated VLBW children lower in all curriculum areas. Significantly more VLBW children were found to be ‘failing’ in one or more subject and an increased proportion compared with the control children had received remedial education. The VLBW group showed no evidence of ‘catch up’ between 6 and 12 years of age. Multiple regression analyses were used to identify predictors of cognitive and educational outcome. The duration of mechanical ventilation in the neonatal period was inversely related to outcome. Full‐Scale IQ at 6 years, motor‐skills score at 6 years, and head circumference at 12 years all predicted outcome at 12 years, as did maternal education, family income and size. Individually, many VLBW children perform satisfactorily, but as a group VLBW children appear to be at a long‐term disadvantage to peers in the areas of cognitive and educational performance.

Narrative as a tool for the assessment of linguistic and pragmatic impairments

Narrative ability is one of the most interesting and ecologically valid ways in which to measure communicative competence both in normal populations and in clinical groups, since narratives form the basis of many childhood speech acts. Narrative may also prove to be a good tool for distinguishing clinical groups who show overlapping symptoms but who are thought to experience subtly different impairments. This article gives an overview of some of the theoretical reasons for using narrative to assess both linguistic and pragmatic impairments. As part of a preliminary investigation examining possible similarities and differences across groups, five children with severe pragmatic language impairments (PLI) and five with more typical specific language impairments (SLI) completed short picture based narratives using the Bus Story and the Frog Story. These illustrative data are included throughout the paper to highlight features of use to clinicians, particularly with respect to differences in the narratives of children with PLI compared to their peers with SLI. Furthermore, when compared to Tager-Flusberg’s (1995) data from children with autism, SLI narratives seem to be more similar to those of the group with autism than did PLI narratives. Narrative ability was found to relate directly to pragmatic skill but in different ways according to clinical subgroup. Implications for both theory and practice are discussed.

Non-word repetition and language development in children with specific language impairment (SLI).

Non-word repetition has previously been found to correlate with language outcomes both in children who are language impaired and in those who are developing normally. This paper concerns a group of children identified as having specific language impairment (SLI) and follows the methods of Adams and Gathercole (2000) by taking children with the highest and the lowest non-word repetition scores at age 11. These childrens language and literacy abilities were then compared. Despite the fact that high and low scorers were matched on Performance IQ tasks (Block Design and Picture Completion), all linguistic measures except for vocabulary assessments showed significant differences between the groups. The fact that these differences were present despite block design scores being identical for the two groups suggests that more than a general working memory deficit underlies the language difficulties. Furthermore, significant differences were noted on a digit-span task requiring processing and production of number words. A specific phonological memory difficulty may therefore be present over and above a subtle but more general processing limitation. The implications for SLI theory and practice are discussed.

Follow-up of children attending infant language units: outcomes at 11 years of age

A large cohort of 242 children who had been attending infants language units at 7 years of age was followed up when the children were in their final year of primary school. Two hundred (83%) of the children were reassessed at 11 years of age on a wide battery of language and literacy measures, on a test of non-verbal ability, an autism checklist and a communication checklist. In total, 89% of children still scored < 1 SD from the mean on at least one test of language and the majority (63%) scored poorly on three or more assessments demonstrating widespread difficulties. Compared with non-verbal abilities at 7 years of age, a large proportion of the cohort also performed poorly on performance IQ subtests (28%). A further 10 children scored highly on a checklist for autistic spectrum disorder. Thus, only 115 (58%) children could be said to meet criteria for specific language impairment. A small group of 16 children appeared to have entirely resolved their difficulties. These outcomes and their implications for education and long-term impact of the disorder are discussed.

Motor impairment in children 12 to 13 years old with a birthweight of less than 1250 g.

AIM--To determine whether poor motor skills, previously identified in a cohort of very low birthweight (< 1250 g) children, born in 1980-1, have persisted or improved. Previous assessments had shown significant improvement between the ages of 6 and 8 years. METHODS--The original cohort were traced and were assessed using the Movement Assessment Battery for Children, an update of the Test Of Motor Impairment, used at 6 and 8 years. Where possible the classroom-matched controls from the original studies were assessed, otherwise new controls were selected. Teachers were also asked to identify those children whom they considered clumsy. Forty seven of the original cohort of 53 children, all but one still attending mainstream school, and 40 original and 20 new classroom-matched controls were studied. RESULTS--Fifty one per cent of the cohort showed clinically important or borderline impairment. More of these children had significant impairment (16/47, 34%) than the controls (3/60, 5%). The improvement seen by 8 years of age was maintained but there was no further improvement. Girls had significantly higher overall impairment scores (median 16; interquartile range 10-21.5) than the boys (5.5 (1.5-12.5)), and on a wider variety of subtests (5/8) than the boys (3/8). CONCLUSIONS--Many very low birthweight children have impaired motor skills. Despite early improvement it persists into adolescence and the deficit remains. Interventional studies may help to see if these problems can be alleviated.

Language in Autism and Specific Language Impairment: Where Are the Links?

It has been suggested that language impairment in autism is behaviorally, neurobiologically, and etiologically related to specific language impairment (SLI). In this article, the authors review evidence at each level and argue that the vast majority of data does not support the view that language impairment in autism can be explained in terms of comorbid SLI. The authors make recommendations for how this debate might be resolved and suggest a shift in research focus. They recommend that researchers concentrate on those aspects of language impairment that predominate in each disorder rather than on those comparatively small areas of potential overlap.

Social and behavioural difficulties in children with language impairment

This paper examines the secondary social and behavioural difficulties of a large cohort of children attending language units in England. In stage 1 of the study, 242 children with language impairments were assessed on a measure of peer competence, a behavioural measure, a cognitive measure and also using teacher opinion of emotional/behavioural status in school year 2 (age 6-7). A year later, 214 of the children were followed up at age 7-8 years. The group is examined as a whole and in terms of subgroups according to type of language impairment. While the group pattern for behavioural difficulties showed that children in language units do not generally have clinical-level behavioural problems, the scores were significantly different by subgroup, with children exhibiting mainly expressive difficulties showing the least secondary behavioural problems and children with mixed expressive and receptive problems showing the greatest increase in behavioural scores from stage 1 to stage 2. Children with complex receptive and complex language impairments were the most likely to score over the clinical threshold when examined by frequency and these children were also rated as having more marked social difficulties with peers than the other subgroups. Agreement between questionnaire score and teacher opinion was high. Patterns of social and behavioural impairment showed no associations with gender or cognitive ability. The implications of the findings are discussed in relation to other studies on social or behavioural impairment in this population.

Short‐term memory and vocabulary development in children with Down syndrome and children with specific language impairment

A longitudinal comparison was made between development of verbal and visuo-spatial short-term memory and vocabulary in children with Down syndrome (DS), children with specific language impairment (SLI), and typically developing children as a control group. Participants were 12 children with DS (6 males, 6 females; mean chronological age 9y 9mo [SD 2.8 mo], range 8y 6mo to 11y 4mo); nine children with SLI (4 males, 5 females; mean chronological age 3y 9mo [SD 4.8mo], range 3y 3mo to 4y 5mo); and 12 typically developing children (5 males, 7 females; mean chronological age 4y 4mo [SD 3.9mo], range 3y 3mo to 4y 3mo). Participants were matched on mental age (mean mental age 4y 3mo). All participants completed verbal short-term memory, visuo-spatial short-term memory, and expressive and receptive vocabulary tasks on three occasions over 1 year. Similarities were seen in the clinical groups for verbal short-term memory. There was some evidence of difficulty in visuo-spatial short-term memory in the children with SLI relative to the other groups, but all three groups showed overlap in visuo-spatial short-term memory performance. At the final time-point vocabulary performance in the clinical groups was similar; the typically developing children showed higher vocabulary abilities than both clinical groups.

Emotional Health in Adolescents with and without a History of Specific Language Impairment (SLI).

OBJECTIVE This study examined the emotional health of adolescents with and without specific language impairment (SLI). METHOD One hundred and thirty-nine adolescents with a history of SLI (15;10 years) and a peer group of 124 adolescents with normal language development (NLD) (15;11 years) participated, who were in their final year of compulsory schooling. The risk of emotional difficulties was assessed using the Moods and Feelings Questionnaire (MFQ) and the Child Manifest Anxiety Scale-R (CMAS-R). Comprehensive language and cognition data were available for all participants (NLD and SLI) concurrently and also longitudinally for those with SLI. RESULTS A clear increased risk of emotional health symptoms was found for the SLI group on both self- and parental-report. Girls scored less favourably than boys when groups were combined, but these were due to the effect of the NLD group, with no gender differences found in the SLI group. Direct links with language and cognition were not obvious. Instead, more diffuse factors such as family history of emotional health difficulties may warrant further investigation. CONCLUSION There is a marked higher rate of anxiety and depression symptoms in adolescents with SLI. However, these do not appear to be a direct result of impoverished communicative experiences.