Linguistic organisation and coherence in personal narratives of 10-year-old children with developmental language disorder

Abstract

This study aims to investigate the linguistic organisation and coherence of personal narratives among children with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) to provide insight into their communication skills in everyday contexts. A cohort of 10-year-old Croatian-speaking children diagnosed with DLD ( n = 50, M = 10;8) and their gender-matched typically developing peers (TLD; n = 50, M = 10;2) participated in the study. All participants were asked to produce personal narratives in response to the Global TALES protocol, a standard protocol in which the child is asked to tell personal stories in response to six emotion- and situation-based prompts. Their responses were analysed at micro- and macro-structure levels on measures of vocabulary, grammar, productivity and coherence. Findings indicate that children with DLD have difficulties in both grammatical aspects of narrative production (complexity and accuracy) and the formation of coherent personal narratives, characterised by difficulties in creating chronologically organised and thematically elaborated narratives. Moreover, narrative measures, particularly those pertaining to grammar, demonstrate sensitivity in accurately predicting group membership, distinguishing between children with DLD and their TLD peers.