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The early use of first and second person pronouns has been viewed as a sign of emerging social understanding. However, it may also depend on general language development: pronouns do not appear among the first words children acquire. In addition, some languages conjugate verbs for person, and the inflections may thus show similar relations to social understanding and language as pronouns. Very few studies have examined the relations between early person reference on the one hand and both social understanding and language development on the other. The present study used data on spontaneous language transcripts and language tasks from 58 Czech-speaking children aged 30 months to examine the relations between person reference, social understanding, and general language development. Social understanding was estimated from children's use of the mental state language (MSL). The results confirm that both MSL and general language development show unique relations to person reference with pronouns as well as verbs.

Purpose: This study examined two markers of language impairment (LI) in a single experiment, testing sentence imitation and grammatical morphology production using an imitation task with masked morphemes. One goal was to test predictions of the morphological richness account of LI in Czech. We also tested the independent contributions of language and memory skills to sentence imitation performance. Method: Seventeen children with LI (5;1-7;6 [years;months]) and 17 vocabulary-matched typically developing (TD) children (3;8-4;11) were administered a sentence imitation task where each sentence had one noun or verb ending replaced by a coughing sound. In addition, a receptive vocabulary and the digit span (backward and forward) tasks were administered. Results: Children with LI were significantly less accurate than TD children in sentence imitation task. Both vocabulary and digit span had unique effects on sentence imitation scores. Children with LI were less successful in imitating the target words, especially verbs. However, if they succeeded, their completions of the masked morphemes were no less accurate than in TD children. The accuracy of completions was affected by the morpheme frequency and homophony, but these effects were similar in TD and affected children. Conclusions: Sentence imitation is a measure of language skills and verbal memory. Results on morpheme completions are consistent with processing models of LI, but some predictions of the morphological richness model were not confirmed. The results suggest that children with LI might have a deficit in organizing morphosyntactic relations in sentences, rather than in morphological processing proper.

The aim of this study was to test whether the availability of internal imagery elicited by words is related to ratings of word imageability. Participants are presented with target words and, after a delay allowing for processing of the word, answer questions regarding the size or weight of the word referents. Target words differ with respect to imageability. Results show faster responses to questions for high imageability words than for low imageability words. The type of question (size/weight) modulates reaction times suggesting a dominance of the visual domain over the physical-experience domain in concept representation. Results hold across two different languages (Czech/German). These findings provide further insights into the representations underlying word meaning and the role of word imageability in language acquisition and processing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The study examined the effects of imageability and phonological neighborhood density on the acquisition of word production in Czech, controlling for part-of-speech class, word length, and word frequency. Phonological neighborhood density is of interest because previous research has not examined highly inflected languages such as Czech. The effects of imageability on word acquisition are widely assumed, but only a few empirical studies examined such effects using child data directly. Method: Data from the Czech norming study of the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories (Smolík, Turková, Marušincová, & Malechová, 2017) adaptation were used, and all nouns and action words in the data set were examined (total 359). Based on the norming sample of 493 children, the expected age of acquisition was calculated. Results: A small but significant effect of neighborhood density (explaining 1.5% of unique variance) was found, as well as a robust effect of imageability (9% of unique variance). Imageability also accounted for the difference between nouns and verbs in the age of acquisition. Conclusion: Imageability is a robust predictor of word age of acquisition that should be taken into account in future studies. The identifiability of the referent and the memory mechanisms are likely responsible for the strong imageability effect. Words with large phonological neighborhoods are acquired earlier, even in a language with complex inflectional morphology.

Two experiments examined Czech children's comprehension of grammatical number marking in verbs. Children were presented with picture pairs involving one or multiple participants in the same action, and were asked to point to the picture described by a recorded sentence. Experiment 1 (N = 72, age 3;0-4;7) tested four types of sentences, some of which marked the number of participants on the verb only. There was a marked increase in comprehension scores with age and receptive vocabulary scores in singular, but not in plural sentences. This pattern was present regardless of how number was marked. Experiment 2 (N = 45, age 3;4-4;9) replicated the key findings of Experiment 1. The results suggest that comprehension of morphological number markers remains difficult even when children routinely produce such markers. However, when compared with results from other languages and experimental paradigms, it appears that the effect is due mainly to children's comprehension of the task and not limitations in their grammatical knowledge.

Purpose: We examined the properties of mean length of utterance (MLU) in Czech, a morphologically complex Slavic language. We compared the scores of MLU calculated in different units and based on different sample lengths and assessed its validity against another transcript and test-based measures. Method: One hundred nine children were recorded during free-play at 2;6 and 3;11 (years;months). We compared MLU in syllables, morphemes, and words (MLUw) in transcripts of different lengths (50, 75, 100, and all available utterances). For evaluating the validity of MLU, we also calculated Index of Productive Syntax (IPSyn) and number of different words (NDW) and used results of receptive vocabulary and grammar comprehension tests. Results: The different MLU measures based on different sample lengths correlated closely with MLU in transcripts of all utterances (all rs > .87). We found mostly strong correlations between MLU, IPSyn, and NDW at both time points and weak or moderate correlations between MLU and grammar and vocabulary. Regression models showed the significant unique effect of MLUw at 2;6 for MLUw (β = .29) and grammar (β = .33) at 3;11 and vocabulary (β = .27) at 3;7. Conclusion: MLUw based on all utterances was confirmed as a valid measure of early language skills in Czech, as it is stable in time and shows concurrent and predictive relations with other transcript-based and test-based measures. Supplemental Material: https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.25215203 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose Propositional density (PD) is a measure of content richness in language production that declines in normal aging and more profoundly in dementia. The present study aimed to develop a PD scoring system for Czech and use it to compare PD in language productions of older people with amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) and control participants matched on age, gender, and education. Method Groups of patients with aMCI and cognitively healthy control participants (N = 20 each) provided short spoken and written language samples. Two samples were elicited for each modality, 1 describing recent events and 1 describing childhood memories. Series of neuropsychological tests were administered. The groups were compared using t-tests and the relations between measures using correlation coefficients. Results PD was lower in spoken productions of patients with aMCI, compared with control participants, but only in language samples using remote memories. PD in these samples was related to verbal fluency and education but not to working memory. PD in written samples did not differ between participants with aMCI and control participants. Conclusions PD in spoken language reflects the cognitive decline in people with aMCI, but the effect is relatively mild. The results support the existing findings that PD is related to verbal fluency.

Background: Past research has shown that peer victimization by bullying is associated with peer rejection and fear of victimization, but little is known about the interplay between victimization and other characteristics in the prediction of these experiences. We assume that the associations between victimization and peer rejection/fear of victimization are moderated by multiple characteristics, including aspects of peer ecology. Aims: The study tested whether the links between victimization and peer rejection/fear of victimization are moderated by gender, peer support, and two features of classroom peer ecology: classroom victimization rate and classroom hierarchy (the variability of popularity among students). Sample: The sample included 512 early adolescents attending sixth grade retrieved from 25 elementary school classrooms. Methods: Participants completed a set of self-report and peer nomination instruments in classroom settings. Results: Multilevel linear modelling showed that higher levels of peer rejection were associated with higher victimization, male gender, and lower peer support. The association between victimization and peer rejection was attenuated for females and when the classroom victimization rate was higher. A higher fear of victimization was related to higher victimization, female gender, lower peer support, and a higher classroom victimization rate. The link between victimization and fear of victimization was strengthened by female gender and higher levels of classroom hierarchy. Conclusions: The results indicate the relevance of the interplay between victimization and gender and between victimization and classroom peer ecology in understanding peer rejection and fear of victimization.

Imageability is the ability of words to elicit mental sensory images of their referents. Recent research has suggested that imageability facilitates the processing and acquisition of inflected word forms. The present study examined whether inflected word forms are acquired earlier in highly imageable words in Czech children. Parents of 317 children (mean age 28 months) were asked whether their child used specific forms of 63 nouns and 35 verbs. For nouns, the forms were nominative singular and plural; for verbs, third person singular present, second person singular present, and the past participle. Plural nouns, and second person and past participle verbs were considered the marked, inflected forms. Analyses revealed that imageability is positively related to the use of the inflected form, even when controlling for the use of the unmarked form in each child, and the inflected form frequency. Two main explanations are suggested: facilitation of form retrieval from long-term memory, or facilitation of inflected form processing, especially by supporting the representations in working memory.

This article reports on an experiment that examined the comprehension of transitive sentences in Czech children and its relationship to case marking, word order and information structure. A total of 107 Czech children aged 2;9-4;5 were tested for comprehension of noun-verb-noun sentences in which word order and given-new status of individual nouns were manipulated. The results confirmed that noncanonical, object-initial sentences are generally more difficult to comprehend than sentences with the standard word order, but that many children can interpret noncanonical sentences before 4 years of age. Information structure did not have any clear effect on sentence comprehension. Overall, the results indicate that children have some abstract knowledge of word order and case marking when they first show evidence of transitive sentence comprehension, but initially they cannot use this knowledge when word order and case marking signal conflicting interpretations. Information structure is not a major factor in early sentence comprehension.

Some research in child language suggests that semantically general verbs appear in grammatical structures earlier than semantically complex, specific ones. The present study examines whether this was the case in nouns, using imageability as a proxy measure of semantic generality. Longitudinal corpus data from 12 children from the Manchester corpus in CHILDES were used to obtain information on the first occurrence of plurals. A total of 3,560 uninflected nouns were identified in the corpora, of which 1,202 were observed in the plural. Survival analyses indicated that the chance of observing a plural form increases with the imageability rating of the noun, even after accounting for the age of acquisition of the uninflected noun, maternal input frequency, and word length. Noun imageability thus facilitates the acquisition of plural forms. This finding contradicts the observations from verbs, and indicates that the acquisition of grammar is facilitated by high imageability rather than semantic generality.

Purpose: The authors examined sentence imitation as a potential clinical marker of specific language impairment (SLI) in Czech and its use to identify grammatical markers of SLI. Method: Children with SLI and the age-and language-matched control groups (total N = 57) were presented with a sentence imitation task, a receptive vocabulary task, and digit span and nonword repetition tasks. Sentence imitations were scored for accuracy and error types. A separate count of inaccuracies for individual part-of-speech categories was performed. Results: Children with SLI had substantially more inaccurate imitations than the control groups. The differences in the memory measures could not account for the differences between children with SLI and the control groups in imitation accuracy, even though they accounted for the differences between the language-matched and age-matched control groups. The proportion of grammatical errors was larger in children with SLI than in the control groups. The categories that were most affected in imitations of children with SLI were verbs and clitics. Conclusion: Sentence imitation is a sensitive marker of SLI. Verbs and clitics are the most vulnerable categories in Czech SLI. The pattern of errors suggests that impaired syntactic representations are the most likely source of difficulties in children with SLI.

Purpose: This article reviews 43 adaptations of the MacArthur–Bates Communicative Development Inventories (MB-CDIs), a tool used for measuring children’s communicative and language skills. The aim is to provide an overview of different approaches to develop local versions of the instrument (reflecting linguistic and cultural specifics) and to formulate recommendations and suggestions that expand the current guidelines of the MB-CDI Advisory Board. The article also discusses cross-linguistic differences in the structure of this tool, as well as the availability of sources for the language-specific MB-CDI adaptations. Conclusions: Strategies differ in the construction of the inventory contents and in the norming phase, as well as in documenting reliability and validity. The most frequent strategies in developing the item lists are translations of existing CDIs and pilot administrations; relatively recent strategies include consultations with child development experts. The norming approach varies in, for example, the number of participants and techniques of administrations. When establishing age-related norms, different methods of growth curve construction are used. We recommend methods that consider the complete data set and provide a code example. We suggest that the reliability of the tool should be documented not only as internal consistency but also using test–retest measures, ideally combined with interrater agreement. It is desirable that adaptations establish criterion validity against other measures of language development, such as structured tests, spontaneous language samples, or experimental methods. In summary, by critically reviewing the different adaptation strategies, the present review article provides guidance for teams that adapt the MB-CDI into new languages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Person-referring pronouns in the first and second person (I, your) have been viewed as signs of increasing social understanding in children due to their shifting reference properties. However, they are linguistically complex elements and might depend on general language development. We used longitudinal transcript data from Manchester corpus (12 children aged 2 to 3 years) to examine concurrent and predictive relations between pronouns, general language development (MLU), and social understanding (indexed by the use of mental state language). In the key analysis, social understanding but not general language was found to be a developmental precursor of first-, second- and third-person pronoun mastery. Results suggest that social understanding is needed for acquisition of all person reference, not only in first and second person. Results for first- and third-person pronouns were more similar than for second person, suggesting that social-cognitive demands of person reference go beyond shifting reference of first- and second-person. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Age of acquisition (AoA) is presumed to reflect the age or relative order in which words are learned, but is often measured using adult ratings or adult-reported observations and might thus reflect more about the adult language than about the acquisition process. Objective AoA estimates are often limited to words whose referents can be shown in pictures. We created a corpus-derived AoA estimate based on first word occurrences in a longitudinal corpus of child English, and evaluated its reliability and validity against other measures of AoA. Then we used these different measures as concurrent predictors of adult lexical decision times. Our results showed adequate reliability and good relations with other AoA measures, especially with parent-reported AoA (r = 0.56). Corpus AoA did not predict unique variance in lexical decision times, while adult AoA ratings and parent-reported AoA did. We argue that this pattern is due to two factors. First, the adult AoA ratings and parent-reported AoA are confounded with adult memory, lexical processing and reading difficulty variables. Second, the adult AoA ratings are related to actual age of acquisition only for words acquired during later preschool and school age. Our analyses support the utility of corpus-derived AoA estimates as an objective measure of acquisition age, especially for early-acquired words. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Speech rhythm is considered one of the first windows into the native language, and the taxonomy of rhythm classes is commonly used to explain early language discrimination. Relying on formal rhythm classification is problematic for two reasons. First, it is not known to which extent infants' sensitivity to language variation is attributable to rhythm alone, and second, it is not known how infants discriminate languages not classified in any of the putative rhythm classes. Employing a central‐fixation preference paradigm with natural stimuli, this study tested whether infants differentially attend to native versus nonnative varieties that differ only in temporal rhythm cues, and both of which are rhythmically unclassified. An analysis of total looking time did not detect any rhythm preferences at any age. First‐look duration, arguably more closely reflecting infants' underlying perceptual sensitivities, indicated age‐specific preferences for native versus non‐native rhythm: 4‐month‐olds seemed to prefer the native‐, and 6‐month‐olds the non‐native language‐variety. These findings suggest that infants indeed acquire native rhythm cues rather early, by the 4th month, supporting the theory that rhythm can bootstrap further language development. Our data on infants' processing of rhythmically unclassified languages suggest that formal rhythm classification does not determine infants' ability to discriminate language varieties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigate the acquisition of different functions of wh-words in Czech (Slavic) - a language where wh-words are highly polyfunctional. Our working hypothesis is that the acquisition proceeds in accordance with the growth of the syntactic tree (aka the growing trees hypothesis; Friedman et al. 2021), which in turn is matched by the growth of the semantic representation. More specifically, children are expected to first acquire wh-interrogatives, then conditionals, correlatives, and free relatives, and finally (light-)headed relatives. The working hypothesis is set against the background of what could be considered the null hypothesis, namely that children’s production matches the adult input. We have examined the Czech CHILDES corpus (Chromá et al. 2024; 6 children 1;07-3;09), tagging all wh-occurrences (nearly 11 thousand tokens) for the construction they appear in. Using both descriptive and inferential statistical methods, we have found evidence either supporting or being compatible with our hypothesis. At the same time, our results are not consistent with a simple input-based account. We also discuss some limitations of a corpus-based approach for addressing our research question. The most significant hurdle is the overall low frequency of non-interrogative wh-words. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present a new set of subjective Age of Acquisition (AoA) ratings for 299 words (158 nouns, 141 verbs) in seven languages from various language families and cultural settings: American English, Czech, Scottish Gaelic, Lebanese Arabic, Malaysian Malay, Persian, and Western Armenian. The ratings were collected from a total of 173 participants and were highly reliable in each language. We applied the same method of data collection as used in a previous study on 25 languages which allowed us to create a database of fully comparable AoA ratings of 299 words in 32 languages. We found that in the seven languages not included in the previous study, the words are estimated to be acquired at roughly the same age as in the previously reported languages, i.e. mostly between the ages of 1 and 7 years. We also found that the order of word acquisition is moderately to highly correlated across all 32 languages, which extends our previous conclusion that early words are acquired in similar order across a wide range of languages and cultures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Previous studies of relations between parenting self-concepts, parental adjustment and child temperament have been ambiguous regarding the direction of influence; and have rarely followed families from pregnancy through the first year of life. The current study examines change and stability in maternal depressive symptoms, parenting competences and child temperament through the perinatal period until nine months postpartum. Methods: Czech mothers (N = 282) participated at three time points: the third trimester of pregnancy (Time 1), six weeks (Time 2) and nine months postpartum (Time 3). Questionnaire data concerned depressive symptoms (T1, T2, T3), maternal parenting self-esteem (T1, T2) and sense of competence (T3), and child temperament (T2, T3). A path model was used to examine concurrent and longitudinal relations between these variables. Results: The analyses indicated longitudinal stability of all constructs, as well as concurrent relations between them. Longitudinal relations supported child-to-parent, rather than parent-to-child, effects: child difficult temperament predicted decreases in perceived maternal parenting competences, but maternal variables did not predict change in infant temperament. In addition, we observed weak mutual relations between maternal depression levels and parenting competences, such that maternal depression diminished perceived parenting competences that in turn contributed to higher levels of depression. Conclusion: Mothers’ confidence in their ability to parent is influenced by their experience with a difficult infant and by their depressive symptoms during the child’s first year of life. Depressive symptoms are, in turn, aggravated by mothers’ low perceived competences in the parenting role. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article details the adaptation of the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory (MB-CDI) into Czech, focusing on communicative skills in infants aged 8 to 18 months, including vocabulary and gestures specific to the Czech language and culture. Topics include the adaptation methods, piloting with Czech caregivers and children, and the tool's potential applications in assessing communicative development and identifying areas for further assessment in children.

Goal. The paper reports on a standardization of a short parent-report screening tool for quick assessment of vocabulary in children aged 16 to 42 months. The tool should capture the early signs of a delayed or disrupted language development. The method asks for children's use and comprehension of 40 words. Participants. The tool was standardized on a group of 1047 children (535 boys) that was demographically diverse and was obtained in different regions of the Czech Republic. Analysis. Developmental norms and growth curves were calculated using generalized additive linear models. Linear regression was used to test the effects of various demographic factors on the scores. Results. The norms correspond to the expectations about the growth of vocabulary with age. Girls show statistically significant advantages in both production and comprehension. Statistically significant but weak relations were found between comprehension scores on one hand, and maternal education and population size of the hometown on the other. Limitations. The method is based on parent reports, which may result in lower reliability. This norming study has not directly assessed concurrent validity with other methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives. The data from Brno longitudinal study were used to examine the relations between receptive vocabulary in 50-year-olds and various cognitive and personality variables in earlier ages. Two questions were addressed in particular: 1) Is receptive vocabulary related to measures of verbal IQ in childhood, and 2) are vocabulary scores in adults related to their personality traits. Sample. The study used the sample from the Brno Longitudinal Study. This originally included about 500 participants who entered the study at birth between 1961 and 1963. In 2011, 76 of these participants were examined. Hypotheses. It was hypothesized that vocabulary performance at 50 will be related to measures of verbal IQ in childhood. With regard to the relation between vocabulary skills and personality, the general hypothesis was that such relations are possible, but no specific predictions were made. Analysis. Least squares regression analyses were used to examine the data, with the vocabulary score as the dependent variable. The analyses controlled for the relation between vocabulary and nonverbal intelligence by including nonverbal skills as one of predictors in the regression models. Results. Vocabulary scores in adulthood showed a robust relation with verbal intelligence at 12 years of age, but only marginally significant relation with verbal intelligence at 8 years. No personality measures showed robust relations with adult vocabulary, only NEO openness was weakly related to higher vocabulary. Some measures of neuroticism showed marginally significant relation with lower vocabulary. Conclusions. Even though vocabulary is an aspect of human knowledge that can change considerably during adulthood, it shows a strong relation with verbal skills in late childhood. Personality traits have rather limited effects on the change of vocabulary in adulthood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Goals. The study aimed to collect a set of psycholinguistic norms for subjective properties of words, and describe the relations between these properties and the lexical decision times for the words. Sample and procedure. The set of words included 63 nouns and 35 verbs. Two questionnaires were created that included these words. One was an online questionnaire assessing the adult-rated age of acquisition (AoA). The main questionnaire was a paper questionnaire administered to the final-year high-school students (N=249, age 18-20). The students always rated one of the following properties: concreteness, imageability, specificity, and familiarity. In addition to these ratings, the frequencies of the words in corpora of spoken and written Czech were used, and lexical decision latencies measured. Hypotheses. One hypothesis was that the lexical decision times will be related to the word ratings: lower AoA, and higher imageability/ concreteness/specificity/familiarity, should be related to faster decision times. Statistical analyses. The data were evaluated using the Pearson correlation coefficient, the partial correlation coefficient, and linear regression. Results. The data from Czech confirmed the findings from other languages: nouns show higher imageability than verbs, imageability and concreteness are highly correlated, familiarity is related to spoken frequency more closely than to written frequency. Regression models showed that all subjective norms have statistically significant relation with the lexical decision times, above and beyond frequency and word length. Limitations. The principal limitation for further generalizations is the small sample of words for which ratings were obtained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives. It has been shown that propositional density (PD), which roughly corresponds to the number of ideas expressed in a text of given length, is related to cognitive performance in the older age. The present study investigated differences in propositional density in oral language production between healthy seniors and patients with mild cognitive impairment (MCI). MCI is generally accepted as a prodromal stage of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Sample and setting. The sample included 33 MCI persons and 32 healthy controls (mean age 73 years). The groups were equivalent as for the age and education. As expected, there was a significant difference between Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) scores between the groups, with MMSE being a simplified measure of their cognitive status. Hypotheses. Lower PD was expected in MCI persons, as the task required recent past recall which is considered one of the early deficiencies in early AD and MCI due to AD. Statistical analysis. Mean PD across groups was compared using the independent samples t-test. Results. Mean propositional density in MCI persons was 48,74% (SD 5,78), and in healthy controls 53,06% (SD 4,56). The difference was statistically significant (p<0,001). Cohen's d 0,83 represents a large effect size for the group difference. Study limitations. The main limitation is the heterogeneity of the MCI group. Also, the detailed cognitive status of the healthy controls is unknown. Thus the group could include persons with some cognitive impairment which has not been detected yet. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives. The aim of the study is to present an original Czech questionnaire KLI-P designed to measure the psychosocial climate in maternity hospitals as reflected by the parturients. Subject and setting. Qualitative data analysis of 189 narratives about the childbirth and 44 semistructured interviews was performed. The first version of the KLI-P was administered to 760 parturients. The final version of the KLI-P was verified on a representative sample of the Czech parturients (N = 762). Statistical analysis. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were used to examine underlying structure of the instrument. Cronbach's a was calculated to assess the internal consistency of the component scales. To assess the concurrent validity, correlations between questionnaire scales and four empirical criteria items were examined. Results. Exploratory factor analysis of the KLIP identified the following dimensions of psychosocial climate for both delivery (DU) and after- birth units (ABU): helpfulness and empathy, control and involvement in decision-making, communication of information and availability of caregivers, dismissive attitude and lack of interest, physical comfort and services. Cronbach 's alpha of individual scales ranged from 0,74 to 0,93 for DU and from 0,73 to 0,93 for ABU. With high content and concurrent validity and high reliability, as well as short and easy administration, the KLI-P appears to be a useful tool for clinical practice and research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives. Test the use of language samples elicited during the presentation of standardized psychometric methods for the diagnostics of language development using methods for language sample analysis. Validate the use of Mean Length of Utterance (MLU) against standardized measures of grammatical development in a sample of children of the same age. Subjects and settings. Total of 135 children aged on average 72.2 months (SD=3.7) participated. Linguistic productions of the children during the administration of the WPPSI vocabulary subtest were analyzed. This language sample was used for calculating the MLU and other indices. Additionally, children were administered Czech adaptations of standardized tests of grammatical development: TROG-2 for sentence comprehension and a test of morphological production. Hypotheses. MLU and other sample-derived indices should show significant relationships between the test measures of grammatical comprehension and production. Statistical analyses. Correlations, linear regression models. Results. There were significant relationships between MLU and the tests of grammar comprehension and morphological production. The number of be-forms and prepositions per utterance were also related to the grammar tests. MLU was independently predicted by both grammar comprehension and the production of grammatical morphology. The results show validity of MLU in a sample of same-age children, which is rare in the available literature. Study limitations. The language samples provided by children's definitions differed widely in size and style, which may underestimate the relationships between MLU and grammatical test measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multilevel modeling is a flexible alternative to the traditional factorial ANOVA approach in the analysis of experimental data with repeated measures. This article describes a psy-cholinguistic experiment and provides a detailed account of the data analysis, demonstrating the use of multilevel models to include a continuous predictor and complex assumptions about error variance. The experiment investigated the effects of structural priming on reaction times in a word monitoring task. Pairs of sentences with identical or different syntactic structures were presented to 4- and 5-year-old children, whose task was to respond to a word presented in the second sentence. Multilevel modeling analysis revealed an interaction between the experimental condition and position of the trial within the experiment: the reaction times in the same-structure condition decreased over the course of the experiment, while they increased in the different-structure condition. The analysis demonstrates how multilevel models can be used to detect change in responses over the course of an experimental session. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of the lexicon and its structure is an essential indicator of the level of language acquisition and cognitive development. This paper summarizes the basic methods used in the research on lexical development, namely the analysis of spontaneous speech production, experimental procedures and vocabulary testing. Parental report inventories are examined in detail, focusing on the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories (MAB CDI). The structure, psychometric characteristics and usage of the MAB CDI are described. The paper reports on the design and results of the first pilot study of MAB CDI for toddlers (16 - 30 months) in Czech. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An on-line preferential looking study investigated the processing of word order and case forms in 3-year-old and 5-year-old Czech children. Children listened to simple transitive sentences with subject-initial or object-initial word order while watching two pictures. One picture corresponded to the sentence presented, the other picture showed the same participants involved in the same action but in reversed agent/patient roles. In 3-year-olds, we found a nonsignificant preference for the target picture during the presentation of the sentence-final word, and there was no significant effect of the experimental condition. In 5-year-olds there was a significant preference for target pictures. The absence of significant effect of the experimental condition suggests that 5-year-old children have no detectable problems in understanding sentences with reversed word order. The study reports first experiences with using the method in Czech children and suggestions for its implementation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The perceptual attunement to native vowel categories has been reported to occur at 6 months of age. However, some languages contrast vowels both in quality and in length, and whether and how the acquisition of spectral and duration-cued contrasts differs is uncertain. This study traced the development of infants' sensitivity to native (Czech) vowel-length and vowel-quality contrasts. The results suggest that in a vowel-length language, infants learn to categorize vowels in terms of length earlier and/or more robustly than in terms of quality, the representation of which may still be relatively underdeveloped at 10 months of age.