Abstract
BackgroundDevelopmental Language disorders (DLD) are developmental disorders that can affect both expressive and receptive language. When severe and persistent, they are often associated with psychiatric comorbidities and poor social outcome. The development of language involves early parent-infant interactions. The quality of these interactions is reflected in the quality of the child’s attachment patterns.We hypothesized that children with DLD are at greater risk of insecure attachment, making them more vulnerable to psychiatric comorbidities. Therefore, we investigated the patterns of attachment of children with expressive and mixed expressive- receptive DLD.MethodsForty-six participants, from 4 years 6 months to 7 years 5 months old, 12 with expressive Specific Language Impairment (DLD), and 35 with mixed DLD, were recruited through our learning disorder clinic, and compared to 23 normally developing children aged 3 years and a half. The quality of attachment was measured using the Attachment Stories Completion Task (ASCT) developed by Bretherton.ResultsChildren with developmental mixed language disorders were significantly less secure and more disorganized than normally developing children.ConclusionsInvestigating the quality of attachment in children with DLD in the early stages could be important to adapt therapeutic strategies and to improve their social and psychiatric outcomes later in life.
Highlights
Developmental Language disorders (DLD) are developmental disorders that can affect both expressive and receptive language
The differences seen in the expression of affects and the poor narrative skills could be related to the language impairment among children with mixed language disorders (MLD), since we found a weak correlation between the severity score on the expressive scale and the narrative scales “Symbolic distance” (Rho = − 0.4; p = 0.01) “poor narrative skills” (Rho = 0.35; p = 0.03), and “Appropriate Expression of Affect” (Rho = 0.34; p = 0.04) in the MLD group, but not in the Expressive language disorder (ELD) group (Spearman correlation coefficient; p < =0.05)
We found that the use of the Attachment Stories Completion Task (ASCT) was well suited to the characteristics of children with DLD, especially at younger ages, when therapeutic interventions are thought to be the most efficacious
Summary
Developmental Language disorders (DLD) are developmental disorders that can affect both expressive and receptive language. Developmental Language Disorders (DLD) are one of the most frequent causes of consultation in child psychiatry Their prevalence was estimated to be 7.56% in a recent survey on 12,398 children aged 4 to 5 in the United Kingdom, making them among the most common disorders in early childhood. The distinction between expressive and mixed types of language impairment has been removed, as has the difference between verbal and nonverbal intellectual skills; in addition, language disorders can be associated with other diagnoses, such as autism spectrum disorders. In both definitions, the diagnosis comes with certain exclusion criteria, such as neurological disorders, hearing impairment, or intellectual disability, and language disorder has a significant impact on the child’s global functioning
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