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Pragmatics can be defined as the appropriate use of language in social interactions. Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and children with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) exhibit difficulties in pragmatic language (PL), but the nature and sources of these difficulties have not been fully investigated yet. The purpose of this paper is to critically review empirical literature on the PL of children with ASD as compared to that of children with DLD. Thirteen studies that met established inclusion criteria were identified and reviewed. Children with ASD and children with DLD demonstrated several similarities in PL. However, a lot of differences were observed and mainly children with ASD faced more profound difficulties than children with DLD, while PL may be a distinct marker between the two groups. The differences observed in the language profiles of ASD and DLD show that even if there is an overlap in some domains, the PL abilities of children of both clinical populations are likely to be controlled by different mechanisms and therefore these differences in PL may be considered as a distinguishable feature between the two populations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and aims: Current evidence shows that children with developmental language disorder (DLD) benefit from spaced retrieval during word learning activities. Word recall is quite good relative to recall with alternative word learning procedures. However, recall on an absolute basis can be improved further; many studies report that fewer than two-thirds of the words are learned, even with the assistance of spaced retrieval during the learning activities. In this article we identify details of spaced retrieval that are less well understood in an effort to promote more effective learning through retrieval practice. Main contribution: We discuss the importance of factors such as: (a) integrating immediate retrieval with spaced retrieval trials; (b) determining whether gradual increases in spacing have more than short-term benefits relative to equal spacing; (c) discovering the number of successful retrievals sufficient to ensure later recall; (d) using spaced retrieval to avoid erosion of phonetic details on later recall tests; and (e) whether the well-documented difficulties with learning word forms might be tied to a particular subgroup of children with DLD. We also speculate on some of the possible reasons why spaced retrieval is beneficial in the first place. Conclusions: Although many children with DLD make gains in word learning through procedures that incorporate spaced retrieval, there are numerous details involved in the process that can alter its success. Until we have a better understanding of the boundaries of spaced retrieval's effectiveness, we will not be taking full advantage of this promising addition to word learning procedures. Implications: Spaced retrieval activities can be an important addition to the resources that clinicians and educators have available to assist children in their word learning. With a deeper understanding of the issues discussed here, we should be able to put spaced retrieval to even greater use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Children with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) often experience co-occurring psychosocial difficulties, the developmental trajectories of which are still not fully understood. This study sought to explore the manifestation of such difficulties during childhood, through first-hand accounts of those with DLD and their close relatives. Individual semi-structured interviews were conducted with 11 mothers of children with DLD (aged 6-12 years old) and were analysed alongside the secondary data from interviews of five adults with DLD. Interviews were conducted online; all participants resided in Europe and were fluent in spoken and written English. A process of interpretive phenomenological analysis resulted in the development of five overall themes: experiencing anxiety, social frustrations, maintaining factors, childhood strengths and the parenting experience. Cognitive appraisals appeared particularly important during childhood in both escalating and maintaining anxiety, low self-esteem, emotion dysregulation and social frustrations. High levels of isolation and stress were experienced by all mothers. The findings suggest parents in the United Kingdom and Ireland require more support and guidance at the point of diagnosis than is currently provided. Emphasis was given to the link between children's experience of anxiety and social behaviours, such as withdrawal, as well as their intolerance of uncertainty. Internalising symptoms were a prioritisation for intervention during childhood by both parents and adults with DLD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A 12-year-old boy received a diagnosis of an unspecified "language disorder," suggesting the possibility of Specific Language Impairment (SLI) along with atypical pausing behavior. Interested to find out the possibility of incorporating pausing behavior into SLI diagnosis, this research sought to explore the distinctions in pause patterns between the spoken Bahasa Indonesia (BI) and English of Indonesian children, utilizing data from the child with suspected SLI (sSLI) and a control group for comparative analysis. Employing a quantitative approach and analyses related to phonology, syntax, and bilingual language production, the study revealed that the child with sSLI tended to display longer and more frequent pauses than the control group, particularly during communication in BI. Despite multiple influencing factors, pause patterns had the potential to serve as an indicative tool and a means to integrate bilingualism into the diagnosis of SLI.

Background: The current study sought to examine whether psycholinguistic assessments could discriminate children and adolescents with developmental language disorder (DLD) from those with attention‐deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD; combined or inattentive subtype) and comorbid DLD + ADHD. Methods: The Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals—Screening Test (CELFST; Wiig et al., 2013), the Comprehensive Test of Phonological Processing (nonword repetition subtest; Wagner et al., 2013), and the Test of Word Reading Efficiency (sight word and phonemic decoding subtests; Torgesen et al., 2012) were examined in 441 children and adolescents between 6 and 16 years of age. Results: The presence of a language disorder (with or without ADHD) predicted poor performance across tasks. Children and adolescents with ADHD (combined vs. inattentive) only significantly differed in sight word reading, in favor of those with combined type. Measures of reading efficiency could distinguish between the two types of ADHD, but not between other groups. Interestingly, scores on the standard language screener were no worse for children with ADHD + DLD than children with DLD only. Conclusions: The combination of comorbid ADHD + DLD did not appear to be associated with lower language abilities, sight word reading, or phonemic decoding relative to DLD alone. Reading efficiency was effective in discriminating between ADHD subtypes. These findings offer valuable insights into differential diagnosis and the identification of comorbidity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background/Objectives: The intranasal delivery of various neurotropic substances is considered a new attractive therapeutic approach for treating neuropathologies associated with neuroinflammation and altered regeneration. Specific language impairment (SLI) that arises as a result of damage to the cortical speech zones during the developmental period is one of the most common problems in preschool children, and it is characterized by persistent difficulties in the acquisition, understanding, and use of language. This study's objective is to evaluate the efficacy and safety of intranasal immunotherapy using the M2 macrophage secretome as a rich source of immunoregulatory and neurotrophic factors for the treatment of severe language impairment in children. Methods: Seventy-one children (54 boys and 17 girls, aged 3 to 13 years) were recruited to participate in a clinical trial (NCT04689282) in two medical centers. The children were examined before, 1 month after, and 6 months after the start of therapy. In the vast majority of children (55/71), language impairment was associated with autistic-like symptoms and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Results: Daily intranasal inhalations of M2 macrophage-conditioned medium (for 30 days) were well tolerated and led to a decrease in the severity of language impairments, autistic-like behavior, and ADHD symptoms. The clinical effect appeared within a month after the first procedure and persisted or intensified during a 6-month follow-up. Two-thirds of the children showed a clear clinical improvement, while the rest had less pronounced improvement. Conclusions: Thus, the use of the M2 macrophage secretome and its intranasal delivery is safe, well tolerated, and clinically effective in children with severe language impairments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Children suffering with spontaneous speech impairment or inappropriate communication abilities like disordered speech or delayed speech face challenges when involved in conversations. One of the motivating reasons for this work is to use the potential of deep learning models along with an effective feature extractor to automate the detection of specific language impairment (SLI) in children. Clinicians or speech pathologists use standard assessment tools that are time consuming as well as prone to various behavioural factors which can compromise the timely identification of the SLI in children. Moreover, the scarcity of annotated disordered children's speech adds to the complexity of training the reliable SLI detection model. The recent work focuses mainly on the utterance of vowels, scanning the acoustic features or the texture of the children's speech signals to detect the SLI. This work seeks to evaluate different components of children's speech like vowels, consonants and sentences to diagnose healthy and disordered speech. Speech samples are collected from Indian children in the age-group of 5-15 years speaking a secondary language English. The proposed method makes use of a combination of mel frequency cepstral co-efficients and i-vectors as a feature vector to identify SLI and distinguish it from mispronunciations due to second language usage. Moreover, analysis of variance (ANOVA) test has been implemented to choose the most significant MFCC and i-vector features. Finally, the selected features are given as input to pretrained models like VGG-16, MobileNet-v2, ResNet-50 and ResNet-101. Eventually, we study and evaluate the effect of parameters like age and model used on different parameters of speech like vowels, consonants, 3-word, 4-word and 5-word sentences in the dataset to diagnose healthy and disordered speech samples. 5-fold cross validation (CV) has been used to compensate for the limited size of dataset and achieve robust results. The experimental results show that with the proposed implementation method highest accuracy of 98.70% can be achieved on the vowels component in identifying the disordered children speech signals using MobileNet-v2 model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Executive functions (EFs) are related abilities, associated with the frontal lobes functions, that allow individuals to modify behavioral patterns when they become unsatisfactory. The aim of this study was to assess EFs in children with sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL) and in children with "specific language impairment" (SLI), compared with a control group of children with normal development, to identify specific skill deficits. Three groups of preschool children aged between 2 and 6 years were assessed: 19 children with normal hearing, cognitive, and language development, 10 children with SNHL, and 20 children with SLI. The FE-PS 2-6 Battery was used for the assessment of preschool EFs, supplemented with the Modified Bell Test for the analysis of selective attention. Statistically significant differences were found between the two experimental groups and the control one, regarding the investigated skills. Children with SNHL showed a clear deficit in flexibility, whereas children with SLI had greater problems in self-regulation and management of waiting for gratification. Selective attention was found to be deficient in all three groups, with no statistically significant differences. This study shows that the skills investigated were found to be deficient in both SNHL and SLI patients. It is essential to start targeted exercises based on specific deficient skills as part of the rehabilitation program. It is of great importance to understand the consequences of EF deficit in preschool children to achieve an accurate diagnosis and carry out customized rehabilitation programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Médica Clínica Las Condes is the property of Editorial Sanchez y Barcelo and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Journal of Special Needs Sciences is the property of Beni Suef University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The use of machine learning algorithms for the assessment of speech fluency is increasingly becoming recognized globally due to their ability to quickly identify speech impairments. This approach is preferred over manual diagnosis, as it reduces the likelihood of human error and minimizes the delay in commencing the therapy. A pipelined deep learner-dual classifier (PDL-DC) is proposed for the automated detection of speech impairment. The assessment of individuals’ speech fluency consisted of two distinct phases: the classification of speech disfluencies and the categorization of fluency disorders. Speech disfluencies, including revisions, prolongations, whole-word repetitions, word-medial repetitions, and filled pauses, were categorized into distinct groupings. The second aspect of classification pertains to the assessment of fluency levels, wherein speakers are classified into three categories: healthy individuals, individuals with stuttering, and individuals with Specific Language Impairment (SLI). The proposed model’s implementation of a pipelined design enables the dual validation of a subject’s fluency. The proposed model demonstrates an average classification accuracy, precision, and recall of 97%.

Purpose: Children with specific language impairment (SLI) might present with speech sound disorder (SSD) and phonological awareness (PA) deficits which put them at risk of potential reading problems. This work aimed to organize an intervention program in Arabic for phonological training and to assess the effect of PA training versus the phonological therapy (PT) for children with SLI and SSD. Methods: The study was carried out on 60 children with comorbid SLI and SSD, aged 5–7 years. Children were equally divided into two groups; each group received language therapy combined with (PT or PA training). Measures of language development, phonological output, and PA were taken before therapy and at 4 month post-therapy for all children. Results: The two therapy groups made nearly the same amount of progress in the development of language and phonological production, with no significant differences regarding language age and percent of consonants correct (PCC). The PA training group progressed more on the PA skills than children who received PT over the same time. Conclusions: PA training could facilitate the development of phonological skills by targeting the child's awareness of phonemes and improving the production of sound patterns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Children without obvious disabilities (hearing loss/low intellectual capacity) may have language skill development issues due to specific language impairment (SLI), a communication disorder. The SLI has a significant impact on a child's speaking, listening, reading, and writing abilities. SLI is typically known as development language disorder, developmental dysphasia, or language delay. Recently, machine learning as well as deep learning techniques have been quite effective in predicting the early stage of SLI, analyzing the disorder severity, and predicting the treatment efficiency. Existing approaches primarily exploited auditory indicators to diagnose communication disorders, frequently leaving out hidden information acquired in the temporal domain. To overcome this drawback, an optimized Bidirectional Long Short Term Memory (BiLSTM) architecture is presented in this paper to handle the speech dynamics. The Improved Hybrid Aquila Optimizer and Flow Directional algorithm known as IHAOFDA is integrated with the BiLSTM architecture to optimize the hyperparameters of the BiLSTM structure. When assessed using the information from the SLI children in the Laboratory of Artificial Neural Network Applications (LANNA) dataset, the proposed model performs better. The IHAOFDA-optimized BiLSTM architecture improves accuracy in classifying different severity levels such as mild, moderate, and severe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The acquisition of numeral classifiers and their associated syntactic structures has been documented and studied in a broad range of East and Southeast Asian languages among typically-developing (TD) young speakers. However, little research has considered how classifiers are acquired by children with developmental language disorder (DLD). The current paper compares and analyzes the development of numeral classifier patterns among a set of Vietnamese speakers, TD and DLD, studied over three years, from kindergarten to second grade. The investigation highlights differences in the performance of children with TD and DLD and describes the areas of classifier use that seem to be most challenging. Children with DLD produced more errors of classifier omission in kindergarten, showed more random alternations in representational forms, and delays in the development of three element classifier structures. Findings are discussed in terms of future directions in the study of classifier use in Vietnamese speakers with DLD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Background The current study sought to examine whether psycholinguistic assessments could discriminate children and adolescents with developmental language disorder (DLD) from those with attention‐deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD; combined or inattentive subtype) and comorbid DLD + ADHD. Methods The Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals—Screening Test (CELFST; Wiig et al., 2013), the Comprehensive Test of Phonological Processing (nonword repetition subtest; Wagner et al., 2013), and the Test of Word Reading Efficiency (sight word and phonemic decoding subtests; Torgesen et al., 2012) were examined in 441 children and adolescents between 6 and 16 years of age. Results The presence of a language disorder (with or without ADHD) predicted poor performance across tasks. Children and adolescents with ADHD (combined vs. inattentive) only significantly differed in sight word reading, in favor of those with combined type. Measures of reading efficiency could distinguish between the two types of ADHD, but not between other groups. Interestingly, scores on the standard language screener were no worse for children with ADHD + DLD than children with DLD only. Conclusions The combination of comorbid ADHD + DLD did not appear to be associated with lower language abilities, sight word reading, or phonemic decoding relative to DLD alone. Reading efficiency was effective in discriminating between ADHD subtypes. These findings offer valuable insights into differential diagnosis and the identification of comorbidity.

Background/Objectives: The intranasal delivery of various neurotropic substances is considered a new attractive therapeutic approach for treating neuropathologies associated with neuroinflammation and altered regeneration. Specific language impairment (SLI) that arises as a result of damage to the cortical speech zones during the developmental period is one of the most common problems in preschool children, and it is characterized by persistent difficulties in the acquisition, understanding, and use of language. This study’s objective is to evaluate the efficacy and safety of intranasal immunotherapy using the M2 macrophage secretome as a rich source of immunoregulatory and neurotrophic factors for the treatment of severe language impairment in children. Methods: Seventy-one children (54 boys and 17 girls, aged 3 to 13 years) were recruited to participate in a clinical trial (NCT04689282) in two medical centers. The children were examined before, 1 month after, and 6 months after the start of therapy. In the vast majority of children (55/71), language impairment was associated with autistic-like symptoms and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Results: Daily intranasal inhalations of M2 macrophage-conditioned medium (for 30 days) were well tolerated and led to a decrease in the severity of language impairments, autistic-like behavior, and ADHD symptoms. The clinical effect appeared within a month after the first procedure and persisted or intensified during a 6-month follow-up. Two-thirds of the children showed a clear clinical improvement, while the rest had less pronounced improvement. Conclusions: Thus, the use of the M2 macrophage secretome and its intranasal delivery is safe, well tolerated, and clinically effective in children with severe language impairments.

Executive functions (EFs) are related abilities, associated with the frontal lobes functions, that allow individuals to modify behavioral patterns when they become unsatisfactory. The aim of this study was to assess EFs in children with sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL) and in children with “specific language impairment” (SLI), compared with a control group of children with normal development, to identify specific skill deficits. Three groups of preschool children aged between 2 and 6 years were assessed: 19 children with normal hearing, cognitive, and language development, 10 children with SNHL, and 20 children with SLI. The FE-PS 2-6 Battery was used for the assessment of preschool EFs, supplemented with the Modified Bell Test for the analysis of selective attention. Statistically significant differences were found between the two experimental groups and the control one, regarding the investigated skills. Children with SNHL showed a clear deficit in flexibility, whereas children with SLI had greater problems in self-regulation and management of waiting for gratification. Selective attention was found to be deficient in all three groups, with no statistically significant differences. This study shows that the skills investigated were found to be deficient in both SNHL and SLI patients. It is essential to start targeted exercises based on specific deficient skills as part of the rehabilitation program. It is of great importance to understand the consequences of EF deficit in preschool children to achieve an accurate diagnosis and carry out customized rehabilitation programs.

Abstract Background It is well-documented that children with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) have a higher likelihood of experiencing anxiety, as well as other socio-emotional and behavioural (SEB) difficulties. Despite this, there is little consensus as to how these difficulties manifest. This study aims to understand the prevalence of broader SEB difficulties and anxiety, informing intervention development by understanding the relationships between them. Methods A mixed-methods, case–control study was conducted. First, an online survey was completed by 107 parents of either children with DLD (“DLD sample”; n = 57) or typically developing children (“typical sample”; n = 50), aged 6–12 years old. Binary SEB statements informed by previous qualitative work (e.g. “my child requires routine/sameness”; “my child has frequent tantrums”) provided an insight into the prevalence of SEB difficulties in both DLD and typical samples. Validated measures of anxiety, emotion regulation, intolerance of uncertainty, insistence on sameness, family stress and coping mechanisms were also collected. Correlation and mediation analyses were run using these validated measures to understand the manifestation of anxiety in children with DLD in more detail. Qualitative interviews were then carried out with a select panel of survey respondents (n = 4). Results The DLD sample scored significantly higher on all binary SEB statements than the typical sample: experiencing anxiety (80.7%, p

Language disorders are frequently comorbid with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Sluggish cognitive tempo (SCT), a second attention disorder, may potentially explain some of the links between language disorders and ADHD. In this study we examined the psycholinguistic abilities of 207 children (mean age 7;10) with and without clinically significant levels of SCT symptoms to determine the degree to which symptoms of language disorder co-occur in cases of SCT. Analyses of children's tense-marking, nonword repetition, and sentence recall indicated that deficits in these areas were not associated with SCT. Instead, SCT appears to be more closely aligned with features of social (pragmatic) communication disorder. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Electrónica de Psicología Iztacala is the property of Facultad de Estudios Superiores Iztacala and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Language disorders are characterized by impairments in verbal expression/understanding, including difficulties with one or more language components. The Virtual Reality Rehabilitation System (VRRS) is a bioelectromedical device equipped with exercise sections aimed at improving cognitive and language deficits. It also increases patient motivation and engagement. The aim of our study was to test the feasibility and efficacy of VRRS intervention to improve speech therapy treatment for children with speech disorders. Thirty-two patients were enrolled in this study and randomly assigned to the experimental (EG) or control group (CG). The CG underwent conventional speech therapy, while EG underwent VRRS-implemented speech therapy. Both groups were evaluated before (T0) and after (T1) the intervention using the Language Assessment Test. The results showed improvements in both groups. However, the EG group showed greater improvement in various areas, including comprehension of total words, repetition, naming of body parts, naming of everyday objects, total naming, morphosyntactic accuracy, sentence construction, average length of utterance, and spontaneous word production. This study demonstrated that VRRS can be a valuable tool for implementing effective speech rehabilitation. Further studies are needed, as the use of VRRS is still in its early stages, requiring larger samples sizes and long-term follow-up. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 pandemic undoubtedly burdened families, perhaps even more for parents of children with neurodevelopmental disabilities. This research aims to determine the anxiety levels in mothers of children with neurodevelopmental disorders (autism spectrum disorder and specific language impairment) and mothers of typically developed children. The cross-sectional study comprised 280 mothers from the period of the COVID-19 pandemic in Serbia. A confidential survey included main demographic data and the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI). Results revealed that the mean levels of STAI-S and STAI-T are elevated in the observed sample of mothers in the first pandemic wave; the STAI-S level is in the high category (STAI-S mean = 46.69), while STAI-T is in the intermediate category near the cut-off value for the high level (STAI-T mean = 43.04). A statistically significant strong positive correlation between STAI-S and STAI-T is seen (r = 0.802, p = 0.001). GLMM analysis revealed that interactions, rather than independent variables, significantly impact anxiety, implying a complex relationship between the observed variables and STAI. Compared with the results from the pre-pandemic study, our findings reveal that COVID-19 affects mothers of children with and without neurodevelopmental disorders in a complex manner, imposing a need for psychological support, which may positively affect mothers' mental health and the development of their offspring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ability to extract patterns from sensory input across time and space is thought to underlie the development and acquisition of language and literacy skills, particularly the subdomains marked by the learning of probabilistic knowledge. Thus, impairments in procedural learning are hypothesized to underlie neurodevelopmental disorders, such as dyslexia and developmental language disorder. In the present meta‐analysis, comprising 2396 participants from 39 independent studies, the continuous relationship between language, literacy, and procedural learning on the Serial Reaction Time task (SRTT) was assessed across children and adults with typical development (TD), dyslexia, and Developmental Language Disorder (DLD). Despite a significant, but very small, relationship between procedural learning and overall language and literacy measures, this pattern was not observed at the group‐level when examining TD, dyslexic, and DLD groups separately. Based on the procedural/declarative model, a positive relationship was expected between procedural learning and language and literacy measures for the typically developing group; however, no such relationship was observed. This was also the case for the disordered groups (ps >.05). Also counter to expectations, the magnitude of the relationship between procedural learning and grammar and phonology did not differ between TD and DLD (ps >.05), nor between the TD and dyslexic group on reading, spelling, and phonology (ps >.05). While lending little support to the procedural/declarative model, we consider that these results may be the consequence of poor psychometric properties of the SRTT as a measure of procedural learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This study investigated EEG alpha rhythm spectral power in children with Specific Language Impairment (SLI) and compared it to typically developing children to better understand the electrophysiological characteristics of this disorder. Specifically, we explored resting-state EEG, because there are studies that point to it being linked to speech and language development. Methods: EEG recordings of 30 children diagnosed with specific language impairment and 30 typically developing children, aged 4.0-6.11 years, were carried out under eyes closed and eyes open conditions. Differences in alpha rhythm spectral power in relation to brain topography and experimental conditions were calculated. Results: In the eyes closed condition, alpha rhythm spectral power was statistically significantly lower in children with specific language impairment in the left temporal (T5) and occipital electrodes (O1, O2) than in typically developing children. In the eyes open condition, children with SLI showed significantly lower alpha rhythm spectral power in the left temporal (T3, T5), parietal (P3, Pz), and occipital electrodes (O1, O2). There were no statistically significant differences between the groups in relation to the relative change (the difference between average alpha rhythm spectral power during eyes closed condition and average alpha rhythm spectral power during eyes open condition divided by average alpha rhythm spectral power during eyes closed condition) in the alpha rhythm spectral power between the conditions. Conclusion: Lower alpha rhythm spectral power in the left temporal, left, midline parietal, and occipital brain regions could be a valuable electrophysiological marker in children with SLI. Further investigation is needed to examine the connection between EEG alpha spectral power and general processing and memory deficits in patients with SLI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Children without other causes of language delay, such as deafness, intellectual disability, neurological impairment and major emotional problem, or socioeconomic disadvantage, may be affected by specific language impairment (SLI), a communication disorder. A child's language skills (including those of speaking, listening, reading, and writing) might be negatively affected by SLI. Objective: Review of the literature on Specific language impairment. Methods: We scoured scholarly papers and databases like PubMed, Google Scholar, and Science Direct for information on specific language disability. Only the latest or most comprehensive study between March 2000 and September 2022 was considered. The authors also analysed references from similar literature. Documents written in languages other than English have been overlooked because of a lack of funding to translate them. Unpublished articles, oral presentations, conference abstracts, and dissertations were all generally agreed upon not to constitute legitimate scientific investigation. Conclusion: About 8% of kindergarteners have specific language impairment, making it one of the most prevalent developmental disorders. Numerous global studies show that anywhere between seven and fifteen percent of preschool and school-aged children are developing language and literacy skills at a slower rate than their classmates. Children with SLI may have auditory processing or processing difficulties due to interactions between spoken and non-verbal brain substrates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Individuals with specific language impairment (SLI) struggle with language acquisition despite average non-verbal intelligence and otherwise typical development. One SLI account focuses on grammar acquisition delay. The current study aimed to detect novel rare genetic variants associated with performance on a grammar assessment, the Test of Early Grammatical Impairment (TEGI), in English-speaking children. The TEGI was selected due to its sensitivity and specificity, consistently high heritability estimates, and its absence from all but one molecular genetic study. We performed whole exome sequencing (WES) in eight families with SLI (n = 74 total) and follow-up Sanger sequencing in additional unrelated probands (n = 146). We prioritized rare exonic variants shared by individuals with low TEGI performance (n = 34) from at least two families under two filtering workflows: (1) novel and (2) previously reported candidate genes. Candidate variants were observed on six new genes (PDHA2, PCDHB3, FURIN, NOL6, IQGAP3, and BAHCC1), and two genes previously reported for overall language ability (GLI3 and FLNB). We specifically suggest PCDHB3, a protocadherin gene, and NOL6 are critical for ribosome synthesis, as they are important targets of SLI investigation. The proposed SLI candidate genes associated with TEGI performance emphasize the utility of precise phenotyping and family-based genetic study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT Purpose Sentence Repetition Tasks (SRT) have been widely used to assess early language abilities in different languages and populations. In addition, it has been proved that performance in SRTs serve as a clinical marker to detect language difficulties. However, most of the research has been conducted in English language and with children older than 4 years of age. Despite this scarcity, [1] developed a SRT for monolingual Spanish-speaking children between 2 and 4 years of age. Initial findings showed that it is a useful tool for discriminating children with different linguistic levels. In addition, the task showed concurrent validity with a nonword repetition task. In the current study we want to explore the predictive validity of this task. Methods We conducted a longitudinal study including 20 monolingual Spanish-Speaking children who were tested twice, at 33 months of age and six months later. In addition to the SRT, participants completed a nonword repetition task [2] and the Spanish version of the Merrill-Palmer-R Developmental Scales [3]. Results showed strong and positive relationships between the different tests when first assessed. We also found strong and predictive relationships between the SRT at time 1 and SRT and the Merrill-Palmer-R at time 2. Conclusion We conclude that the SRT developed [1] is a valid tool for examining early language abilities and its changes over time.

Background: It is well-documented that children with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) have a higher likelihood of experiencing anxiety, as well as other socio-emotional and behavioural (SEB) difficulties. Despite this, there is little consensus as to how these difficulties manifest. This study aims to understand the prevalence of broader SEB difficulties and anxiety, informing intervention development by understanding the relationships between them. Methods: A mixed-methods, case–control study was conducted. First, an online survey was completed by 107 parents of either children with DLD ("DLD sample"; n = 57) or typically developing children ("typical sample"; n = 50), aged 6–12 years old. Binary SEB statements informed by previous qualitative work (e.g. "my child requires routine/sameness"; "my child has frequent tantrums") provided an insight into the prevalence of SEB difficulties in both DLD and typical samples. Validated measures of anxiety, emotion regulation, intolerance of uncertainty, insistence on sameness, family stress and coping mechanisms were also collected. Correlation and mediation analyses were run using these validated measures to understand the manifestation of anxiety in children with DLD in more detail. Qualitative interviews were then carried out with a select panel of survey respondents (n = 4). Results: The DLD sample scored significantly higher on all binary SEB statements than the typical sample: experiencing anxiety (80.7%, p <.05), requiring routine and sameness (75.4%, p <.001) and emotional dysregulation (75.4%; p <.001) were the most common difficulties reported for children with DLD. Using the validated scales, family stress and coping mechanisms were found to only correlate with the manifestation of anxiety in the typical group, not the DLD group. "Intolerance of uncertainty" and "insistence on sameness" were found to fully mediate the relationship between DLD diagnosis and symptoms of anxiety. Parent's interviews provided contextual support for the analysis, as well as highlighting sensory sensitivities as a focus for future research. Conclusions: Parents of children with DLD appear to cope well with their children's complex SEB needs. Intervention focussing on intolerance of uncertainty may help the management of difficulties with anxiety. Behaviours such as insistence on sameness should be investigated further, as potential indicators for anxiety amongst children with DLD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Article production difficulties in Spanish-speaking childrenwith specific language impairment (SLI) are well documented.However, evidence on article comprehension is scarce. In aneye tracking experiment, we compared online comprehensionof definite and indefinite articles in monolingual Spanish-speaking children with SLI and children with typical languagedevelopment (TLD) matched for age. Children listened tosimple phrases while inspecting a visual context with fourimages. The article in the phrase agreed in number and genderwith the target image only. Visual target preference wasmonitored as the phrase unfolded. Eye movements revealedthat children with SLI showed a weak preference for the targeton indefinite article trials only after hearing the noun, althoughno significant effects of definiteness were observed. Incontrast, children with TLD were able to use the article toanticipate the noun. These findings contribute to reducing thegap between article production and comprehension in childrenwith SLI.

Resumen: Los trastornos del lenguaje generan repercusiones en el funcionamiento comunicativo de los sujetos. Los trastornos específicos del lenguaje (TEL) corresponden a dificultades de alta prevalencia y que afectan el rendimiento académico y social de los niños y niñas. Existe gran variabilidad en la entrega de apoyos a esta población y muchas veces la información relacionada con tales apoyos no está explicitada. En consecuencia, puede resultar difícil realizar una práctica basada en la evidencia. El objetivo de este artículo fue identificar la evidencia actual sobre los componentes claves de la intervención en lenguaje en niños con TEL. Se realizó una revisión panorámica en la cual se examinaron 35 artículos científicos que cumplieron con los criterios de elegibilidad. Se observó una gran variabilidad en cada uno de los componentes evaluados, especialmente en las técnicas, actividades, modelos de servicios y dosis. En factores tales como agentes y objetos de intervención, se observa una tendencia a priorizar el trabajo directivo del fonoaudiólogo y temas lingüísticos más tradicionales, con una leve tendencia a incluir variables cognitivas no lingüísticas. Por lo tanto, se concluye que la terapia fonoaudiológica entrega resultados positivos, sin embargo, se observan algunos factores de la intervención que no se consideran plenamente, tal como el trabajo colaborativo e inclusivo, y escasa consideración de elementos más naturalistas. Abstract: Specific Language Impairments (SLI) correspond to high prevalence difficulties that affect both academic and social performance in boys and girls. There is a great variability in the delivery of support to this population and often the information in this regard is not explicit. Consequently, evidence-based practice can be difficult to implement. The aim was to identify the current evidence on the key components of language intervention in children with SLI. A scoping review was carried out in which 35 scientific papers that met the eligibility criteria were examined. A great variability is observed in each of the evaluated components, especially in the techniques, activities, service models and doses. In factors such as agents and object of intervention, there is a tendency to prioritize the directive work of the speech therapist and to study more traditional linguistic topics, with a slight tendency to include cognitive variables. Speech therapy provides positive results, however, some intervention factors are observed that are not fully considered, such as collaborative and inclusive work, and little consideration of more naturalistic elements.

Specific language impairment (SLI) is one of the most common diseases in children, and early diagnosis can help to obtain better timely therapy economically. It is difficult and time-consuming for clinicians to accurately detect SLI through standard clinical assessments. Hence, machine learning algorithms have been developed to assist in the accurate diagnosis of SLI. This work aims to investigate the graph of the favipiravir molecule-based feature extraction function and propose an accurate SLI detection model using vowels. We proposed a novel handcrafted machine learning framework. This architecture comprises the favipiravir molecular structure pattern, statistical feature extractor, wavelet packet decomposition (WPD), iterative neighborhood component analysis (INCA), and support vector machine (SVM) classifier. Two feature extraction models, statistical and textural, are employed in the handcrafted feature generation methodology. A new nature-inspired graph-based feature extractor that uses the chemical depiction of the favipiravir (favipiravir became popular with the COVID-19 pandemic) is employed for feature extraction. Finally, the proposed favipiravir pattern, statistical feature extractor, and wavelet packet decomposition are used to create a feature vector. Moreover, a statistical feature extractor is used in this work. The WPD generates multilevel features, and the most meaningful features are selected using the NCA feature selector. Finally, these chosen features are fed to SVM classifier for automated classification. Two validation methods, (i) leave one subject out (LOSO) and (ii) tenfold cross-validations (CV), are used to obtain robust classification results. Our proposed favipiravir pattern-based model developed using a vowel dataset can detect SLI children with an accuracy of 99.87% and 98.86% using tenfold and LOSO CV strategies, respectively. These results demonstrated the high vowel classification ability of the proposed favipiravir pattern-based model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, we examined the verb morphology system of Turkish-speaking preschoolers with developmental language disorder (DLD) and compared their use to that of two groups of typically developing (TD) children. We report data from a total of 80 monolingual children – 40 children with DLD, 20 TD age-matched children and 20 TD younger MLU-matched children. Language samples obtained from the children served as the source of the data. The results show that the children with DLD were less accurate in their use of verb suffixes than both the younger and the age-matched TD children. The most frequent error types included use of bare stems, omission of the suffix, and replacing one finite verb suffix with another. The distinction between witnessed past and reported past also posed a challenge. Multi-level model results showed that phonemic length and irregular morphophonology were the best predictors of the children's level of accuracy. These results indicate that even though Turkish is considered a "verb friendly" language, children with DLD do not succeed in closing the gap with their TD peers. The complex interplay of morphology and phonology in Turkish appears to be the major obstacle for children with DLD acquiring this agglutinative language. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Children with Specific Language Impairment (SLI), currently referred to as Developmental Language Disorder (DLD), tend to experience difficulties in reading acquisition, which impacts their academic performance. Despite the importance of reading, there is limited evidence regarding programs specifically designed to support reading development in children with SLI/DLD. Therefore, the objective of this review is to gather information on research studies addressing interventions aimed at supporting reading difficulties in children with SLI/DLD over the past 10 years. The data reveals that there are four studies focusing on such interventions, three of which target metalinguistic skills, oral language, and reading skills. This suggests that a combined approach is the most common proposal for addressing the reading problem in these children. Finally, all studies report successful outcomes of the interventions in supporting reading skills in these children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the comprehension of Relative Clauses (RCs) in 15 Mandarin children with suspected Specific Language Impairment (SLI) (aged between 4; 5 and 6; 0) and 29 typically developing (TD) controls. Results from a Character Picture Matching Task indicate that (i) the subject RC was better understood than the object RC in children with SLI, but there was no asymmetry in the comprehension of the two RCs in TD children; (ii) the performance of children with SLI was significantly worse than that of their TD peers; (iii) children with SLI were prone to committing thematic role reversal errors and middle errors. In order to overcome the shortcomings of previous accounts, we therefore put forward the Edge Feature Underspecification Hypothesis, which can not only explain the asymmetry of comprehension seen in children with SLI but also shed light on the nature of errors committed by them in the task. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study is based on theoretical and empirical understanding of phonemic awareness in Serbian speaking children with and without specific language impairment (SLI). The aim of this paper is to compare the phonemic awareness in children with SLI and children with typical language development (TLD) who are between 5.11 and 7 years of age. This study included 40 participants with SLI and 80 participants with TLD. The subtest for evaluation of phonemic awareness from The Test for Evaluating Reading and Writing Pre-Skills – PredČiP (Kuvač Kraljević & Lenček, 2012) was used. Statistically significant differences were confirmed on both tasks of phonemic awareness (p < .001). The half of children of the SLI group had borderline or poor achievement, generally lower than children with TLD. Bearing in mind that Serbian language has a regular orthography and clear morphological specificities, compared to most world languages, it is expected that Serbian-speaking children would master phonological awareness tasks more easily. Consequently, we believe that an early detection of phonological disorders is particularly important for the Serbian-speaking children. Having in mind that literature data indicate that children who, prior to starting school, are diagnosed with SLI, later encounter interference with reading and writing, we suggest the implementation of a analspecific preventive program for developing phonological skills, or training of phonemic awareness, in all children.

The review study reflects the issue of unclear concept of Specific Language Impairment (SLI) in the Czech environment and reflects the sources of inconsistency of the diagnostic procedures of professionals in practice who work with children with SLI. The central framework of the study is the explanation of the concept of diagnostic markers of SLI which are not sufficiently researched and systematically described in the Czech language. Therefore diagnostic markers of SLI are not taken into account in the diagnostic process of SLI in our enviroment. Based on the theoretical concept of three levels of symptoms of developmental disorders (Snowling & Hulme, 2009) the authors explain that the diagnostic markers reflect the cognitive level of symptoms of the disorder and relate to „key processes" of the disorder. Diagnostic markers can be only detected through psychometric diagnostic methods. There is an insufficient amount of quality and current psychometric instruments for the assesment of language development in Czech enviroment. Therefore diagnostic process of SLI dominantly depends on clinical procedures but clinical procedures allow to see only the behavioral (observable) level of the symptoms of SLI and this problem complicates the understanding of the essence of this disorder. The uncertainties in the concept of SLI influence the quality of intervention procedures that are used for children with this disorder. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adaptive behaviour is defined as a set of conceptual, social and practical skills that are learned and used in everyday life. Assessment of adaptive behaviour is an indispensable part in the identification and classification of intellectual disabilities, but also an important indicator of the development of children with other developmental disorders and children of typical development. The sample was divided into three groups: children with specific language impairment (SLI), children with mild intellectual disability (MID) and children with typical development (TD). The Adaptive Behaviour Diagnostic Scale (ABDS; Pearson, Patton, Mruzek 2016) was used to assess adaptive skills. The objectives of the study were to compare the levels of mastery of adaptive skills in children with SLI, MID and TD children, as well as to examine the impact of each of the individual domains (conceptual, social and practical) on the overall score of adaptive behaviour. The research results showed that children with SLI and MID have significantly poorer achievements compared to TD children. However, although children with SLI have poor performance, the results showed that adaptive skills of these children are significantly better compared to children with MID. Regresion analysis showed that conceptual skills are the best predictor of adaptive behaviour in TD children, while social skills are the best predictor of adaptive behaviour in both children with SLI and children with MID.

Language disorders are characterized by impairments in verbal expression/understanding, including difficulties with one or more language components. The Virtual Reality Rehabilitation System (VRRS) is a bioelectromedical device equipped with exercise sections aimed at improving cognitive and language deficits. It also increases patient motivation and engagement. The aim of our study was to test the feasibility and efficacy of VRRS intervention to improve speech therapy treatment for children with speech disorders. Thirty-two patients were enrolled in this study and randomly assigned to the experimental (EG) or control group (CG). The CG underwent conventional speech therapy, while EG underwent VRRS-implemented speech therapy. Both groups were evaluated before (T0) and after (T1) the intervention using the Language Assessment Test. The results showed improvements in both groups. However, the EG group showed greater improvement in various areas, including comprehension of total words, repetition, naming of body parts, naming of everyday objects, total naming, morphosyntactic accuracy, sentence construction, average length of utterance, and spontaneous word production. This study demonstrated that VRRS can be a valuable tool for implementing effective speech rehabilitation. Further studies are needed, as the use of VRRS is still in its early stages, requiring larger samples sizes and long-term follow-up.