The Effects of Oral Narrative Intervention on the Narratives of Children with Language Disorder: a Systematic Literature Review

Abstract

This systematic review provides an examination of the quality, efficacy, and common features of oral narrative interventions on the narratives of children with language disorder. Searches of electronic data bases, ancestral searches and database alerts identified studies that addressed oral narrative intervention in children with language disorder. Structured inclusion procedures were used to select and examine the quality, efficacy and common features of the included studies. Twenty-four research articles published between 1993 and 2018 were included for review. Apart from measures of social validity, the single case research studies were generally of good quality and results can be interpreted with confidence. The group studies were generally of low quality and only four included comparison groups. Single case effects sizes for macrostructure were moderate with lower effect sizes for microstructure. The results for group studies were variable. Successful interventions included the use of icons, visuals, clinician modelling and the participants being provided with an opportunity to state an entire narrative each intervention session. Oral narrative intervention to develop the narratives of children with language disorder may be effective. Areas for future research were identified and include more robust research designs, intervention being delivered to participants in groups, conducting intervention with participants with more significant disabilities, more research conducted with personal narrative, and including more generalization measures.