Relationships between visual perception and oral language production of young children.

Abstract

This study examined the role of visual perception in the oral language production of young children. The purpose was to identify and specify the extent of relationships between certain visual perceptual processes and selected oral language skills. 48 Ss (CAs, 4 through 8) were given the Marianne Frostig Developmental Test of Visual Perception. Raw scores on each of the 5 subtests served as measures of the visual perceptual processes. Measures of selected skills of oral language (syntactical, morphological, and associative skills) were dependent variables. Step-wise regression techniques showed that the visual perceptual processes contributed significantly to explaining the variance of some skills in all aspects of language sampled. Differentiation among the visual perceptual processes occurred: Spatial Relationships contributed consistently to the morphological and associative skills while Constancy of Shape contributed to the syntactical skills. Implications for language arts instruction and for theory construction related to language development were discussed. Any theory or model of language must make some provision for dealing with extraverbal components of oral language.