Battery Of Standardized Language Tests Research Articles

A multi-group approach to examining language development in at-risk learners.

A battery of standardized language tests and control measures was administered to three groups of at-risk language learners - internationally adopted children, deaf children with cochlear implants, and children with specific language impairment - and to groups of second-language learners and typically developing monolingual children. All children were acquiring French, were matched on age, gender, and socioeconomic status, and were between age 5;0 and 7;3 at the time of testing. Differences between the at-risk and not-at-risk groups were evident in all domains of language testing. The children with SLI or CIs scored significantly lower than the IA children and all three at-risk groups scored lower than the monolingual group; the L2 and IA groups scored similarly. The results suggest that children with limited access to, or ability to process, early language input are at greater risk than children with delayed input to an additional language but otherwise typical or relatively typical early input.

Methods for Identifying Specific Language Impairment in Bilingual Populations in Germany

This study investigates the performance of 22 monolingual and 54 bilingual children with and without specific language impairment (SLI), in a nonword repetition (NWRT) and a sentence repetition task (SRT). Both tasks were constructed according to the principles for LITMUS tools (Language Impairment Testing in Multilingual Settings) developed within COST Action IS0804, and incorporated phonological or syntactic structures that are linguistically complex and have been shown to be difficult for children with SLI across languages. For phonology these are in particular (non)words containing consonant clusters. In morphosyntax complexity has been attributed to factors such as embedding and/or syntactic movement. Tasks focusing on such structures are expected to identify SLI in bilinguals across language combinations. This is notoriously difficult because structures that are problematic for typically developing bilinguals (BiTDs) and monolingual children with SLI (MoSLI) often overlap. We show that the NWRT and the SRT are reliable tools for identification of SLI in bilingual contexts. However, interpretation of the performance of bilingual children depends on background information as provided by parental questionnaires. In order to evaluate the accuracy of our tasks we recruited children in ordinary kindergartens or schools and in Speech Language Therapy centers and verified their status with a battery of standardized language tests, assessing bilingual children in both their languages. We consider a bilingual child language impaired if she shows impairments in two language domains in both her languages. For assessment we used tests normed for monolinguals (with one exception) and adjusted the norms for bilingualism and for language dominance. This procedure established the following groups: 10 typical monolinguals (MoTD), 12 MoSLI, 46 BiTD and 8 bilingual children with SLI (BiSLI). Our results show that both tasks target relevant structures: monolingual children are classified with 100% accuracy. Crucially, both our tasks distinguish BiTDs from MoSLIs and BiTDs from BiSLIs. The NWRT shows high accuracy and only minimal influence of language dominance. The SRT can be scored as “identical repetition” or as “target structure”, the latter aiming for scoring the mastery of a syntactic structure, ignoring lexical and specific case or gender errors. Focusing on the latter measure, we

Comorbidity of Language and Social-Emotional Disorders: Comparison of Psychiatric Outpatients and Their Siblings

To examine factors that differentiate children raised in the same family who are psychiatrically referred from those who are not, 100 referred 4- to 12-year-old children were compared to siblings on a battery of standardized language tests and behavioral checklists. Results indicate a relation among psychiatric referral, externalizing psychopathology, and receptive language disorders. A higher percentage of siblings had language disorders than would be expected based on community prevalence figures; and in 24% of cases, these disorders had not been suspected prior to assessment. Results are discussed in relation to factors that place children within a family at risk for psychopathology.

Chronic Aphasia Subsequent to Striato-capsular and Thalamic Lesions in the Left Hemisphere

The language abilities of a group of seven chronic aphasics with vascular lesions centered on the striato-capsular region and thalamus of the left hemisphere were described. A range of severity and types of chronic language disorder were documented through assessment using a battery of standardized language tests. The most common language disorder documented was a naming impairment of varying degrees of severity, exhibited by six of the seven cases. The majority of subjects made predominantly semantic errors in the naming task; however, each subject produced a variety of error types and there was no pattern of errors characteristic of the group. The language data obtained were used to evaluate previously developed models of the role of the subcortical structures in naming functions.

Language Disorders in Disruptive Behavior Disordered Homicidal Youth

Eight homicidal youths were assessed for language disorders and psychiatric diagnoses using a battery of standardized language tests and the Diagnostic Interview for Children and Adolescents. Both language disorders and Diagnostic and Statistical Manual III-R psychiatric diagnoses were present in all subjects.

Early identification of dyslexia: Evidence from a follow-up study of speech-language impaired children

A group of speech-language impaired children was administered a battery of standardized language tests and measures of phonological processing in kindergarten. Performance on these language measures was then compared to reading ability in first grade. Results indicated that children with semantic-syntactic language deficits had more difficulties in reading than did children with primarily speech articulation impairments. In addition, phonological processing measures were found to be good predictors of reading achievement. Results are discussed in terms of their implications for the early identification of developmental dyslexia.

A comparison of unilaterally hearing-impaired children and normal-hearing children on a battery of standardized language tests.

A group of 25 normal-hearing children aged 6 to 13 years was compared to a group of 25 children manifesting a unilateral hearing impairment of at least 45 dB HL. The two groups were matched on age, I.Q., socio-economic status, sex, and race. Thirty-two percent of the hearing-impaired children failed a grade in school, while none of the normal-hearing children failed. This group of children who failed in school exhibited verbal I.Q.s which were significantly lower than those children who succeeded in school. However, few differences were found between the two groups on a battery of standardized language tests.

The relationship between auditory temporal analysis and receptive language development: Evidence from studies of developmental language disorder

The relationship between sensory, perceptual and motor abilities and receptive language abilities was studied in developmental dysphasic children. The tests administered included experimental auditory, visual and cross-modal perceptual tests. In addition, a battery of neurodevelopmental “soft sign” sensory, perceptual and motor tests were also given. Demographic and case history data were collected. Receptive language was derived based upon a battery of standardized language tests. Multivariate analyses were employed to examine the relationship between receptive language and sensory, perceptual and motor abilities. Results demonstrated that auditory perceptual variables, specifically those requiring rapid temporal analysis, were most highly correlated with the degree of receptive language deficit of the dysphasic children.