Abstract
This study investigated the stability and growth of preschool language skills and explores latent class analysis as an approach for identifying children at risk of language impairment. The authors present data from a large-scale 2-year longitudinal study, in which 600 children were assessed with a language-screening tool (LANGUAGE4) at age 4 years. A subsample (n = 206) was assessed on measures of sentence repetition, vocabulary, and grammatical knowledge at ages 4, 5, and 6 years. A global latent language factor showed a high degree of longitudinal stability in children between the ages of 4 to 6 years. A low-performing group showing a language deficit compared to their age peers at age 4 was identified on the basis of the LANGUAGE4. The growth-rates during this 2-year time period were parallel for the low-performing and 3 higher performing groups of children. There is strong stability in children's language skills between the ages of 4 and 6 years. The results demonstrate that a simple language screening measure can successfully identify a low-performing group of children who show persistent language weaknesses between the ages of 4 and 6 years.
Highlights
This study investigated the stability and growth of preschool language skills and explores latent class analysis as an approach for identifying children at risk of language impairment
We explored the use of a latent class analysis on LANGUAGE4 as a means of identifying different subgroups of 4-year-olds, with a particular focus on trying to identify a stable, low-performing group
Because our primary aim was to assess the classification of the low-performing group, we evaluated the probability estimates for classification of individuals based on their most likely latent class membership, for this group separately
Summary
This study investigated the stability and growth of preschool language skills and explores latent class analysis as an approach for identifying children at risk of language impairment. The aim of screening for language delay is to identify children who are in need of language support (Dockrell, Ricketts, & Lindsay, 2012) Such screening rests on the assumption that “early delays in development predict later delays” Such an assumption is supported by evidence showing strong stability in children’s language ability from an early age (Bornstein, Hahn, Putnick, & Suwalsky, 2014; Rice & Hoffman, 2015) Strong stability in this sense refers to a strong degree of consistency in the relative ordering of individuals in a group of children on some characteristic over time (Bornstein & Putnick, 2012).
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