The study of 813 learning disabled children (ages 6-11) with test-retest data (after three years) on 224 children found the children to suffer a progressive deterioration in verbal ability whereas their nonverbal ability showed an increase in the earlier years, leveling off thereafter. (Author/DB)

Examined effects of social interactions experienced by newborns on later speech ability. Subjects were 20 5-year olds and 20 6-year olds. Children were observed conducting a telephone communication task and also given the British Picture Vocabulary Test. Found that first-borns had larger vocabularies but less-developed conversation skills than…

This study investigated social attention impairments in autism (social orienting, joint attention, and attention to another's distress) and their relations to language ability. Three- to four-year-old children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD; n = 72), 3- to 4-year-old developmentally delayed children (n = 34), and 12- to 46-month-old typically…

This longitudinal study examined a comprehensive set of predictors of preschool language performance in a sample of children of adolescent mothers. Six domains of risk (low maternal verbal ability, intergenerational risk, contextual risk, relational risk, home environmental risk, and child characteristics) for poor preschool language development,…

The study with 60 autistic children (between 3 and 9-years-old) found that children with high-verbal imitation skill did equally well in any of four different modes of language training presentation while those with low-verbal imitation skill did less well in all modes and poorest in the speech-alone condition. (Author/DB)

Discusses speech anxiety in terms of a general theoretical conceptualization of anxiety known as the Trait-State Anxiety Theory and reports on the preliminary development of a scale to measure speech anxiety. (Author)

This paper, supported by a Public Health Research Grant from the National Institute of Mental Health, was presented at the Conference on Symbolic Processes, Akron, Ohio, in October 1970. (VM)

Four- to 10-year olds viewed pictures in which all or some individuals pictured were doing something to all or some objects pictured. Children indicated which sentences, using "all" or "each" to modify the subject or object, applied to the pictures. In choosing the applicable sentence, children showed little difficulty with…

The study examined two female children (ages two and five) with Williams Syndrome (characterized by moderate to severe mental retardation with verbal intelligence quotients significantly higher than performance intelligence quotients). Comparison with both normal and delayed children indicated an unusual cognitive profile. (DB)

Investigated toddlers' acquisition and use of nonsense verbs in passive and active voice. Children used various strategies to answer questions designed to elicit voice changes but did not usually change verb construction. When passive and active constructions were primed, older children were able to use an active-introduced verb in passive…

The spontaneous speech of a six-year-old bilingual child was analyzed for this study. The child has lived in the United States and English is her primary language but her parents speak only French in the home and she has spent several months in France during three visits there. The data used in this study were collected in the child's home by her…

Results indicated significant differences between scores of the 18 low vision children (ages 1.5-4.5 years) and normal seeing agemates on auditory comprehension and verbal ability components of the Preschool Language Scale. (Author/DB)

The acquisition of communicative competence is explored in a study of the emergence of functional use of language among early school-aged children. Cognitive communication strategies and language use in the context of early academic success or lack of success are discussed. Results are presented. (DF)

A simple referential communication task was administered to 3-5 year-olds. Each subject communicated either to an experimenter who apparently could not see the referents that the subject was referring to or to an experimenter who could see the referents. The subjects communicating to an apparently blind experimenter were far more explicit verbally…