Trajectory Of Language Development Research Articles

Trajectories of language development, cognitive flexibility and phoneme awareness knowledge in early childhood.

Early childhood is a critical period of language development. Yet less is known about how language growth relates to the development of phoneme awareness and cognitive flexibility during this period. To examine the longitudinal associations between growth in phonological awareness and cognitive flexibility from 4 to 5 years in relation to three patterns of child language development: early, intermediate and late. A sample of 439 four-year-old children were recruited and underwent repeated language, phonological awareness and cognitive flexibility testing to age 5. Children were classified into three language development groups based on their listening comprehension: early, intermediate and late. Group-based trajectory modelling was then used to examine the relations between cognitive flexibility and phonological awareness over time in relation to language outcome. Early language developers were characterized by higher levels and greater improvement in language and phonological awareness skills between 4 and 5 years. Late language developers exhibited slower growth in expressive language development (in addition to lower receptive language at age 4). Intermediate and late language developers showed steeper growth in cognitive flexibility over the study. Findings affirm the interconnected nature of phoneme awareness, cognitive and language skill development in early childhood. Results suggest the importance of targeting skills across literacy and executive functioning/regulatory domains for children with language difficulties. What is already known on the subject It is already known that language skills are related to self-regulation and phoneme awareness skills. However, it is also important to examine how different patterns of language growth are related to the timing and level of growth in self-regulation and phoneme awareness. Further, it is important to examine the relationship between language development and cognitive flexibility (one component of self-regulation) to understand this relationship more fully. What this paper adds to the existing knowledge This study is novel in its examination of the trajectory of language development and other key foundational literacy variables along with modelling the timing of development across the constructs included in the study. The findings have implications for optimizing the content and timing of approaches designed to enhance literacy development in children with language difficulties. What are the potential or actual clinical implications of this work? The findings suggest that interprofessional approaches across speech-language therapy, education and psychology are important for enhancing literacy outcomes of children with language difficulties. Results also provide support for language intervention approaches to be developed and trialled that target language, cognitive flexibility and phonological awareness in an integrated manner.

Night Sleep, Parental Bedtime Practices and Language Development in Low-Risk Preterm and Full-Term Late Talkers: A Longitudinal Study in the Third Year of Life.

Background: Studies on night sleep and parental bedtime practices and their associations with language development in populations at risk of language delay and neonatal conditions, such as late talkers and preterm children, are scarce. Objectives: Our objective was to longitudinally examine the development of night sleep (total night sleep difficulties, settling, night waking, and co-sleeping), parental bedtime practices (total parental bedtime practices, active physical comforting, encouraging autonomy, and leaving to cry), and expressive language (word and sentence production), and their associations in low-risk preterm and full-term late talkers from 31 to 37 months of age. Methods: Parents of 38 late talkers, 19 low-risk preterm and 19 full-term children, completed the Italian versions of the Infant Sleep Questionnaire, the Parental Interactive Bedtime Behavior Scale, and the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory Words and Sentences Long Form. Results: Late talkers' night sleep difficulties, such as settling to sleep and night waking, decreased over time, with low-risk preterm late talkers experiencing more night waking and co-sleeping than full-term peers. Parents reported that instances of active physical comforting and leaving to cry also decreased, with parents of low-risk preterm late talkers reporting higher active physical comforting scores than parents of full-term peers. Improvements in parental practices of encouraging autonomy were significantly associated with increased sentence production from 31 to 37 months. Conclusions: Findings highlight the importance of monitoring night sleep in preterm and full-term late talkers. They also suggest that populations vulnerable to sleep and language delays may particularly benefit from targeted interventions promoting autonomy in their bedtime routines, which, in turn, could support their language development trajectories.

“Too Much Earthquakes!”: Imagined Transnationalism and Heritage Language Development Trajectories Two Generations After Exile

ABSTRACT International travel is still commonly touted as one of the most effective tools for language learning, yet it remains an elusive activity for those without a certain amount of economic or legal privilege. Although physical return to the home country is not always possible for refugees and their families—even one or more generation after arrival—imagined forms of travel, or ”imagined transnationalism,” is. Drawing on multiple data sources from a year-long, multi-sited ethnographic case study, in this paper I examine how the two young grandchildren of Chileans who arrived in Canada as refugees in the 1970s were imagining their heritage country through different modes, based largely on stories they had been told about it, including those related to their family's exile. The findings suggest that difficult knowledge is a cultural value for some families, and have implications for supporting heritage language learners whose family's experience of migration was spurred by conflict.

Language development trajectories in young children with developmental disabilities in Taiwan

BackgroundLanguage development is critical to various outcomes in young children with developmental disabilities (DD), including autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and non-ASD delays. However, language development trajectories in young children with DD in non-Western populations remain unclear. AimsTo investigate the language development trajectories of young children with DD in Taiwan. We investigated the relationship between trajectory class assignment and diagnostic outcomes (ASD or non-ASD delays) at 3 years after enrollment in the study and the differences in early abilities among children in different trajectory classes. Methods and ProceduresThe participants were 101 young children with DD (mean age: 21.88 months; follow-up: 1.5 and 3 years after enrollment). Growth mixture modeling analyses were conducted to receptive language developmental quotients (RLDQ) and expressive language developmental quotients (ELDQ) on the basis of the Mullen Scales of Early Learning. Outcomes and ResultsThree RLDQ trajectories were identified, namely age expected, delayed catch-up, and delayed, and two ELDQ trajectories were identified, namely delayed improve and delayed. Trajectory class assignment was related to diagnostic outcomes. Children who demonstrated more proficient skills at the early time point, demonstrated improved language outcomes 3 years later. However, adaptive functioning did not differ between the two ELDQ trajectory classes. Conclusions and ImplicationsLanguage development in young children with DD in Taiwan is heterogeneous. Delayed receptive and expressive language development trajectories relate to later ASD diagnoses.

Effects of Prenatal Phthalate Exposure on Early Childhood Expressive Language Development Trajectories

BACKGROUND AND AIM: Phthalates are common endocrine disruptors that can impair neurodevelopment. We investigated potential links between prenatal exposure to phthalates and child language development trajectories given prior inconsistent evidence across individual phthalates. METHODS: We investigated fourteen urinary phthalate metabolites, measured in maternal urine during pregnancy, and child expressive language scores from the Mullen Scales of Early Learning (MSEL) at 6, 12, 24, and 36 months in 231 children from an enhanced autism-risk cohort (19% with autism): Early Autism Risk Longitudinal Investigation (EARLI), born 2009 - 2013 from California, Maryland, and Pennsylvania. We used multiple imputation to handle missingness in MSEL (~37%) and phthalates (~9%), and assigned children to six distinct expressive language trajectories after selecting the latent class growth analysis model with best goodness-of-fit measures. We estimated relative risk ratios (RRR) of being in different language trajectories ("high growth” as reference) associated with two-fold change in creatinine adjusted phthalates using multinomial logistic regression with Firth correction, adjusting for child sex, birth season, income, and maternal age, race, and education. RESULTS: Some low molecular weight phthalates were associated with sub-optimal language trajectories, e.g. RRRs of 1.33 or higher for mono-2-hydroxy-iso-butyl phthalate, peaking at 1.51 (1.02, 2.24) for the delayed growth low trajectory. In contrast, some high molecular weight phthalates exhibited protective effects for delayed growth trajectories but adverse effects for plateau and tracking trajectories: e.g. mono-isononyl phthalate with RRR 0.72 (0.59, 0.89) with delayed growth low but 1.29 (1.08, 1.53) with the tracking low trajectory. Some phthalates exhibited null patterns. CONCLUSIONS: Prenatal phthalate exposure may impact the trajectory of expressive language development in early childhood, with differences by individual phthalates, perhaps by molecular weight group. We observed adverse and protective influences of phthalates that may be influenced by small numbers in each trajectory class. KEYWORDS: phthalates, language development, trajectory analysis

The beauty of diversity in cognitive neuroscience: The case of sex-related effects in language production networks.

Over the past few decades, several studies have focused on potential sex-related differences in the trajectories of language development and functioning. From a behavioral point of view, the available literature shows controversial results: differences between males and females in language production tasks may not always be detectable and, even when they are, are potentially biased by sociological and educational confounding factors. The problem regarding potential sex-related differences in language production has also been investigated at the neural level, again with controversial results. The current minireview focuses on studies assessing sex-related differences in the neural networks of language production. After providing a theoretical framework of language production, it is shown that the few available investigations have provided mixed results. The major reasons for discrepant findings are discussed with theoretical and methodological implications for future studies.

Parental Report via a Mobile App in the Context of Early Language Trajectories: StarWords Study Protocol.

Social sciences researchers emphasize that new technologies can overcome the limitations of small and homogenous samples. In research on early language development, which often uses parental reports, taking the testing online might be particularly compelling. Due to logistical limitations, previous studies on bilingual children have explored the language development trajectories in general (e.g., by including few and largely set apart timepoints), or focused on small, homogeneous samples. The present study protocol presents a new, on-going study which uses new technologies to collect longitudinal data continuously from parents of multilingual, bilingual, and monolingual children. Our primary aim is to establish the developmental trajectories in Polish-British English and Polish-Norwegian bilingual children and Polish monolingual children aged 0–3 years with the use of mobile and web-based applications. These tools allow parents to report their children’s language development as it progresses, and allow us to characterize children’s performance in each language (the age of reaching particular language milestones). The project’s novelty rests on its use of mobile technologies to characterize the bilingual and monolingual developmental trajectory from the very first words to broader vocabulary and multiword combinations.

Language Development in Context

Young children learn to communicate in the language(s) of their communities, yet the individual trajectories of language development and the particular language varieties and modes of communication children acquire vary depending on the contexts in which they live. This review describes how context shapes language development. Building on the bioecological model of development, we conceptualize context as a set of nested systems surrounding the child, from the national policies and cultural norms that shape the broader environment to the particular communicative interactions in which children experience language being used. In addition, we describe how children's developing sensory-motor, perceptual, and social-cognitive capacities respond to and are tuned by the surrounding environment. Closer integration of research on the mechanisms of language learning with investigation of the contexts in which this learning takes place will provide critical insights into the process of language development.

ЭВОЛЮЦИОННАЯ СМЕНА СТРУКТУРЫ ЕДИНИЦ ЗОНЫ НУКЛЕАЦИИ ЯЗЫКОВОГО МАКРОПРОСТРАНСТВА В НЕМЕЦКОМ И АНГЛИЙСКОМ ЯЗЫКАХ

The article analyses the structural evolution of the nuclear units of linguistic macro-space in the German and English languages. Phonetic discrepancy between the descending nuclear tone of an intonational phrase and the ascending nuclear tone of a sonorous vowel in the last syllable of a prosodic unit has played a key role in changing the word structure. In both the languages, accent moved to the first root syllable, which caused cardinal changes in the linguistic systems. Apparently similar alterations resulted in the formation of different language development trajectories.

Language development in children with congenital heart disease aged 12-24 months.

This longitudinal study aims to describe the trajectory of language development in children with CHD aged 12-24 months assessed through an early monitoring and individualized intervention program. We also sought to determine whether early language performances, at 12 months of age, predict 24-month language abilities. We conducted developmental assessments of 49 children with CHD using the Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Developmental, third edition (Bayley-III) at 12 and 24 months, and the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories (MBCDI) at 12, 18 and 24 months. Compared to normative populations, CHD patients showed significantly lower mean scores in both receptive and expressive language scales of the Bayley-III and the MBCDI at 12 months, whereas at 18 and 24 months only expressive language scores were reduced. No differences were found in the cognitive scale. Communicative gestures at 12 months were significantly predictive of language skills at 24 months of age. Our findings indicate specific vulnerability of language outcome, especially in expressive skills, rather than a global cognitive impairment in our patients with CHD. We recommend using communicative gestures as an early marker of language development to improve our ability to detect language delays in this population.

Promoting the development of resilient academic functioning in maltreated children

This study examined (a) the extent of heterogeneity in the patterns of developmental trajectories of language development and academic functioning in children who have experienced maltreatment, (b) how maltreatment type (i.e., neglect or physical abuse) and timing of abuse explained variation in developmental trajectories, and (c) the extent to which individual protective factors (i.e., preschool attendance, prosocial skills), relationship protective factors (i.e., parental warmth, absence of past-year depressive episode, cognitive/verbal responsiveness) and community protective factors (i.e., neighborhood safety) promoted the development of resilient language/academic functioning trajectories. Longitudinal data analyses were conducted using cohort sequential Growth Mixture Model (CS-GMM) with a United States national representative sample of children reported to Child Protective Services (n=1,776). Five distinct developmental trajectories from birth to age 10 were identified including two resilient groups. Children who were neglected during infancy/toddlerhood or physically abused during preschool age were more likely to be in the poorer language/academic functioning groups (decreasing/recovery/decreasing and high decreasing) than the resilient high stable group. Child prosocial skills, caregiver warmth, and caregiver cognitive stimulation significantly predicted membership in the two resilient academic functioning groups (low increasing and high stable), after controlling for demographics and child physical abuse and neglect. Results suggest that it is possible for a maltreated child to successfully achieve competent academic functioning, despite the early adversity, and identifies three possible avenues of intervention points. This study also makes a significant contribution to the field of child development research through the novel use of CS-GMM, which has implications for future longitudinal data collection methodology.

Modeling the Early Language Trajectory of Language Development When the Measures Change and Its Relation to Poor Reading Comprehension.

This study examined change in early language comprehension from 15 to 54months for fifth-grade typical readers (n=35), poor decoders (n=11), or poor comprehenders (n=16) from a nationally representative study of early child-care experiences. Changing measures of language comprehension were captured across early childhood for the 62 children. Multiple-group quasi-simplex and latent growth models were used on rank-transformed outcomes to examine children's relative rank change. Results showed that future poor comprehenders significantly declined in language comprehension over time relative to others who gradually improved. Efforts to improve language skills as a means to improve reading comprehension hinge upon the perspective that language weaknesses are a causal contributor to reading difficulties.

A Longitudinal Study of Lexical and Grammar Development in Deaf Italian Children Provided With Early Cochlear Implantation

A growing number of studies on deaf children with cochlear implant (CI) document a significant improvement in receptive and expressive language skills after implantation, even if they show language delay when compared with normal-hearing peers. Data on language acquisition in CI Italian children are still scarce and limited to only certain aspects of language. The purpose of this study is to prospectively describe the trajectories of language development in early CI Italian children, with particular attention to the transition from first words to combinatorial speech and to acquisition of complex grammar in a language with rich morphology, such as Italian. Six children, with profound prelingual deafness, provided with CI, between 16 and 24 months of age were prospectively assessed and followed over a mean period of up to 34.8 months postimplant. During follow-up, each child received between four to five individual language evaluations through a combination of indirect procedures (parent reports of early lexical and grammar development) and direct ones (administration of standardized receptive and expressive language tests with Italian norms and collection of spontaneous language samples). In relation to chronological age, the acquisition of expressive vocabulary was delayed. However, considering the duration of hearing experience, most CI participants showed an earlier start and faster growth of expressive rather than receptive vocabulary in comparison with typically developing children. This quite atypical result persisted right up until the end of the follow-up. The acquisition of expressive grammar was delayed relative to chronological age, though all but one CI participant achieved the expected grammar level after approximately 3 years of CI use. In addition, the rate of grammar acquisition was not homogeneous during development, showing two different paces: one comparable with normal hearing in the transition from holophrastic to primitive combinatorial speech and a much slower one to attain more advanced levels of morphosyntactic control. From a rehabilitative viewpoint, our results suggest the importance of implementing rehabilitation in lexical comprehension, even when expressive vocabulary appears to be within normal range. Moreover, assessment of language acquisition in CI Italian children should focus on those grammar aspects that are more vulnerable to early acoustic deprivation (such as free and bound morphology) to ensure enhanced language therapy planning.

A Case for Multidimensional Bilingual Assessment

Current assessment practices in the United States are not able to accurately capture the total linguistic, cognitive, and achievement abilities of bilingual learners. There are psychometric complexities involved when assessing and interpreting test results of bilingual students, which impact the validity of this practice. Further, the compromise associated with measuring bilingual students in only one of their two languages has been found to produce a distorted picture, one that has contributed to the overrepresentation of bilingual students in special education programs. This study presents case data using a multidimensional bilingual assessment approach that provides evidence against a single language assessment approach. The results reveal the complexity associated with measuring bilingual students' skills as well as the quandary that is introduced. The case data demonstrate the importance of a multidimensional bilingual assessment that begins with determining a student's cognitive and academic language proficiency. The case data also demonstrate how the reliability and validity of other assessments may be impacted by the unique language development trajectories exhibited by bilingual learners. The study concludes with the recommendation to provide a multidimensional bilingual assessment, which will maximize the reliability and validity of results and provide teachers with the benefit of information in both languages that can then be used to facilitate instructional supports as well as link to meaningful instruction and interventions.

Interpreting the early language trajectories of children from low-SES and language minority homes: implications for closing achievement gaps.

On average, children from low socioeconomic status (SES) homes and children from homes in which a language other than English is spoken have language development trajectories that are different from those of children from middle-class, monolingual English-speaking homes. Children from low-SES and language minority homes have unique linguistic strengths, but many reach school age with lower levels of English language skill than do middle-class, monolingual children. Because early differences in English oral language skill have consequences for academic achievement, low levels of English language skill constitute a deficit for children about to enter school in the United States. Declaring all developmental trajectories to be equally valid would not change the robust relation between English oral language skills and academic achievement and would not help children with poor English skills to be successful in school. Remedies aimed at supporting the development of the English skills required for academic success need not and should not entail devaluing or diminishing children's other language skills.

Linguistic and psychomotor development in children with chromosome 14 deletions

The present study focussed on a specific type of rare genetic condition: chromosome 14 deletions. Children with this genetic condition often show developmental delays and brain and neurological problems, although the type and severity of symptoms varies depending on the size and location of the deleted genetic material. The specific aim of the present study was to describe the developmental trajectories of language skills in a group of children with linear 14q deletions. Four children with an interstitial deletion of the long arm of chromosome 14 were followed for 1 year. Data collected from psychomotor and linguistic assessments highlight a large individual variability. Considering the children's genetic and clinical conditions, findings revealed that the size of the deleted area is not related to outcome. However, the developmental trajectories of language development are deeply influenced by the presence of clinical conditions, such as autism spectrum disorders.

Cochlear implantation in children with postlingual hearing loss

Although it is clear that early auditory stimulation through cochlear implantation (CI) has been shown to improve speech and language development trajectories for children with prelingual hearing loss, data supporting implantation in postlingual children are mostly lacking. The purpose of this study was to characterize speech perception abilities following CI in a group of children with previously well-developed language abilities. Retrospective analysis. Twenty-eight hearing-impaired children who received CIs were selected for study based on the presence of well-developed spoken language skills before implantation. Fifteen children with prelingual hearing loss served as a control group. Speech perception skills were assessed using developmentally appropriate measures. Children with postlingual hearing loss showed a statistically significant improvement in open-set speech perception scores as early as 6 months following CI, whereas prelingual children demonstrated significant improvements only after 24 months of use. Despite these early disparities in performance, the two groups were similar 36 months after implantation and beyond (60 months of implant use). Children with well-developed language abilities before CI showed substantial (and statistically significant) early improvements in open-set speech perception abilities following implantation that continued beyond 2 years of follow-up. These results suggest that postlingual children are excellent candidates for CI.

Estimated effects of in utero cocaine exposure on language development through early adolescence

The potential longitudinal effects of prenatal cocaine exposure (PCE) on language functioning were estimated from early childhood through early adolescence in a large, well-retained urban sample of 451 full-term children (242 cocaine-exposed, 209 non-cocaine-exposed) participating in the Miami Prenatal Cocaine Study (MPCS). The sample was enrolled prospectively at birth, with documentation of prenatal drug exposure status through maternal interview, and toxicology assays of maternal and infant urine, and infant meconium. Age-appropriate versions of the Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals (CELF) were used to measure total, expressive, and receptive language at ages 3, 5, and 12 years. Longitudinal latent growth curve (LLGC) modeling of the data revealed an association between PCE (measured dichotomously as yes/no) and lower functioning in expressive and total language scores, after considering other sources of variation including child's age at testing, sex, prenatal exposure to alcohol, marijuana, and tobacco, and additional medical and social-demographic covariates. Analyses of level of PCE showed a gradient, i.e. dose-dependent, relationship between PCE level and expressive, receptive, and total language scores in the models controlling for age, child's sex, and other prenatal drug exposures. With additional covariate control these findings were most stable for the total language score. The evidence supports an inference about an enduring stable cocaine-specific effect on children's language abilities, with no effect on language growth over time in the longitudinal trajectory of language development.

Describing the Trajectory of Language Development in the Presence of Severe-to-Profound Hearing Loss

The objective of this investigation was to describe the language growth of children with severe or profound hearing loss with cochlear implants versus those children with the same degree of hearing loss using hearing aids. A prospective longitudinal observation and analysis. University of Colorado Department of Speech Language and Hearing Sciences. There were 87 children with severe-to-profound hearing loss from 48 to 87 months of age. All children received early intervention services through the Colorado Home Intervention Program. Most children received intervention services from a certified auditory-verbal therapist or an auditory-oral therapist and weekly sign language instruction from an instructor who was deaf or hard of hearing and native or fluent in American Sign Language. The Test of Auditory Comprehension of Language, 3rd Edition, and the Expressive One Word Picture Vocabulary Test, 3rd Edition, were the assessment tools for children 4 to 7 years of age. The expressive language subscale of the Minnesota Child Development was used in the infant/toddler period (birth to 36 mo). Average language estimates at 84 months of age were nearly identical to the normative sample for receptive language and 7 months delayed for expressive vocabulary. Children demonstrated a mean rate of growth from 4 years through 7 years on these 2 assessments that was equivalent to their normal-hearing peers. As a group, children with hearing aids deviated more from the age equivalent trajectory on the Test of Auditory Comprehension of Language, 3rd Edition, and the Expressive One Word Picture Vocabulary Test, 3rd Edition, than children with cochlear implants. When a subset of children were divided into performance categories, we found that children with cochlear implants were more likely to be "gap closers" and less likely to be "gap openers," whereas the reverse was true for the children with hearing aids for both measures. Children who are educated through oral-aural combined with sign language instruction can achieve age-appropriate language levels on expressive vocabulary and receptive syntax ages 4 through 7 years. However, it is easier to maintain a constant rate of development rather than to accelerate from birth through 84 months of age, which represented approximately 80% of our sample. However, acceleration of language development is possible in some children and could result from cochlear implantation.

Designing studies to investigate the relationships between genes, environments, and developmental language disorders

This paper focuses on designing studies that will compare children with developmental language disorders (DLD) drawn from several syndromes in which there are primary impairments in the acquisition of language. This kind of research can be used to address four key questions: (a) What are the developing language phenotypes that characterize specific disorders? (b) What factors are key precursors and predictors of language acquisition in DLD? (c) What are the genes that contribute to DLD in different syndromes? (d) What environmental factors influence the trajectories of language development in DLD? Several design issues are discussed including an overall study design, subject selection and recruitment, matching and comparisons across groups, and methodologies. A number of important challenges to the design and implementation of these kinds of studies are presented in the final section of the paper.