One of the more widely-used methods for pinpointing children in need of more in-depth language evaluation is screening. One language screening instrument designed to accomplish this in an effective and efficient way was the Clinical Evaluation of Language Functions Elementary Screening Test (CELF-S) (Semel & Wiig, 1980). The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of the CELF-S in identifying those children in a second grade setting, who were in need of more thorough evaluation. This study sought to answer the following questions: 1) What is the percentage of false negatives produced by the CELF-S?, and 2) What is the percentage of false positives produced by the CELF-S?

Researchers have successfully labeled specific patterns of expressive language development as it appears in children developing language normally. Little research has identified particular patterns of expressive language in children who display expressive language disorders or delays. Longitudinal studies of expressively language impaired children indicate that linguistic, educational and social impairments exist long after the language impairment was first identified (Aram, Eckelman and Nation, 1984; Aram and Nation, 1980; Fundudis, Kolvin and Garside, 1979; Stark, Berstein, Condino, Bender, Tallal and Catts, 1984). If patterns of delayed or disordered language development are researched and possibly labeled in the early stages of language development, strategies for assessment and intervention can be made more efficient and the effects of early language impairment on later academic achievement may be prevented. The present study was part of the Portland Language Project, a longitudinal study of early language delay. Lee's Developmental Sentence Scoring (DSS) was used to attempt to identify syntactic patterns used by children exhibiting early language delay. The DSS is a standardized measure for analyzing children's standard English expressive language abilities in the following eight grammatical categories: 1) indefinite pronouns; 2) personal pronouns; 3) main verbs; 4) secondary verbs; 5) negatives; 6) conjunctions; 7) interrogative reversal; and 8) Wh-Questions. Using the DSS, specific syntactical areas of deficit can be identified by analysis of an audiotaped speech sample. A comparison of expressive language in the eight subcategories in the DSS was completed among three groups of preschool children; 1) children developing language normally (the NL group); 2) children who did not meet criteria for normal language development at 20 months, but later fell within the normal range of language development as measured by the DSS (Lee, 1974). This is referred to as the history of expressive language delay group (HELD); and 3) children who did not meet criteria for normal language development at 20 months and again, did not meet criteria for normal language development as measured by the DSS (Lee, 1974) at later ages. This is referred to as the expressive language delay group (ELD). The purpose of this study was to determine if significant differences exist in each of the eight subcategory group scores from the DSS between those children identified as expressively language delayed and those identified as developing language normally at ages three and four. At age three, significant differences were found among the three groups in all eight subcategory scores of the DSS. By age four, the significant differences were found between the delayed group and the normal developing group in the main verb category and the personal pronoun category only. There were no significant differences between the normal developing and the history of delay groups on any of the eight categories at age four. The delayed group exhibited marked improvement and narrowed the deficits in expressive language to a specific area of language. The present study suggested that children with early language delay appear to "catch up" with normal peers in most areas of syntactic production by age four. The DSS (Lee, 1974) provides information about specific areas of syntactic development. Due to the length and complexity of the DSS, it is not a tool that practicing clinicians often use. A study such as this may help the practicing clinician quickly screen a preschool child in a specific syntactic category, such as verb marking, in order to check for possible early language delay. In addition to providing clinical assistance, this study has opened up the door for future research in syntactic development. This study could be expanded to examine the specific verb markers that are being used by the delayed subjects. This may lead to more efficient identification and remediation of early language delays.

Many children with emotional and/or behavioral disorders also present with speech and language disorders (Baker & Cantwell, 1982; Prizant et al., 1990). Children with attention deficits, in particular, have shown a much higher incidence of speech and language disorders than does the general population (Camarata et al., 1988; Cantwell & Baker, 1987) . Traditionally, school speech-language pathologists have been responsible for conducting mass screenings to determine which children should be further evaluated for speech and language disorders. An increasing number of school districts are relying on teacher referrals to determine which children require speech-language evaluations. It was hypothesized that if teachers were able to identify children with attention deficits, these children may be appropriate for referral to speech-language pathologists for speech and language evaluation. The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of the School Situations Questionnaire-Revised {SSQ-R) {Barkley, 1991) in identifying children in the second grade, aged 7:0 to 8:11, who are speech and/or language disordered. This study sought to answer the following primary question: is there an association between the diagnosis of speech and/or language disorders {SLD), and detection by the SSQ-R as at risk for attention and behavior disorders {ABD)? The sample population consisted of 91 students from six second-grade classrooms who met the selection criteria. The SSQ-R, a rating scale designed for teachers to rate behavior related to attention and concentration, was used by classroom teachers to evaluate the subjects to determine if they were at risk for attention and behavior disorders. These results were tabulated along with the number of children diagnosed with speech and/or language disorders in this population. Chi Square analysis showed no significant association for the two measures. It was found that of the 11 SLO subjects, 3 of them, or 27%, were also ABO. Only 3 of the 17 ABO subjects (18%) were also SLO. The 18% of SLO subjects in the ABO population and the 27% of ABO subjects in the SLO group represent a higher percentage of ABD and SLO than is expected in the general population. The higher than average incidence of SLO in the ABO population warrants an awareness of this relationship and the realization that this will impact service delivery. The results of this study indicate that the SSQ-R is not an appropriate measure for teachers to use in determining which children in their classroom would benefit from an assessment for speech and/or language disorders. The high number (82%) of children identified by the SSQ-R as ABD who were not SLD would identify many children who did not require speech and language evaluation. Conversely, the high number (73%) of children not identified as ABD who were SLD by the SSQ-R would neglect many children who require speech/language intervention. The results of this study are not to discount previous research that has suggested an association between attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and speech and language disorders. It is likely that an association exists, but the present study was not able to demonstrate a significant correlation.

No description available.

[Truncated abstract] Some children with Specific Language Impairment (SLI) show poor performance on behavioural tasks designed to measure rapid auditory processing, such as the Repetition Test developed by Tallal and colleagues. Stemming from concerns about whether this task reflects higher-order, cognitive variables, this thesis sought to determine whether the performance deficits SLI children show were evident at the neurophysiological level, with minimal cognitive influences, such as attention, using paradigms designed to elicit the mismatch negativity (MMN) and late discriminative negativity (LDN). In the first two studies, a MMN paradigm, equivalent to the Repetition Test, was trialled with a group of 8 adults. In this paired paradigm, the second tone of a pair of pure tones ascending in frequency ('low'-'high') was occasionally replaced with a 'low' tone. The aim was to determine a 'long' and 'short' intra-pair interval (IPI) with which MMN was generated utilizing this paradigm and that were congruent with the Repetition Test findings (i.e., a long IPI at which SLI were able to perform the task, and a short IPI at which SLI children's performance was selectively impaired). In Study One, MMN to a within-pair frequency change was generated with the 30 ms IPI, but not the 700 ms IPI. The grouping parameters of the temporal window of integration (TWI) and temporal distinctiveness were considered less than optimal for the grouping of the pairs presented at 700 ms IPI for the pre-attentive system to register the within-pair frequency change. ... The frequency difference limens (DLs) of the SLI group were significantly higher than a group of 18 normally developing age- and intelligence-matched peers, but there was no significant difference between the groups in their performance on a control intensity discrimination task. The iii SLI group also showed poorer reading skills, yet frequency discrimination was related to oral language ability only. In the final study, MMN was measured to examine the pre-attentive neurophysiological basis of the SLI group's frequency discrimination deficit. Two frequency deviants that were just above each group's 75% DL on the frequency discrimination task were employed in a simple frequency change paradigm: 40 Hz difference for the control group, and 80 Hz difference for the SLI group. MMN and LDN were elicited in the group of 15 normally developing children to their 40 Hz suprathreshold frequency difference and to the 80 Hz difference. A significant MMN was not observed in the group of 13 SLI children to the 40 Hz difference, which was below their threshold level. However, despite discrimination at the behavioural level, MMN did not reach significance in the SLI group to their 80 Hz suprathreshold frequency difference, yet LDN was observed. MMN was larger in both groups for the 80 Hz difference. Furthermore, MMN and LDN amplitude to the suprathreshold deviants were predictive of both frequency and intensity DLs. These results suggested that SLI children have a pre-attentive neurophysiologically mediated insensitivity to small frequency differences, and that MMN (and LDN) to suprathreshold frequency deviants is a sensitive indicator of group discrimination differences and brain-behaviour relationships in children with and without SLI.

Thesis (M.S.)--Eastern Illinois University, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 62-70).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2000. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 162-178). Available also in a digital version from Dissertation Abstracts.

Thesis (M. Ed.)--University of Hong Kong, 2001. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 75-80).

published_or_final_version / abstract / toc / Educational Psychology / Master / Master of Social Sciences

published_or_final_version / abstract / toc / Educational Psychology / Master / Master of Social Sciences