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PubMed1997

Secondary prevention of paediatric language disability: a comparison of parents and nurses as screening agents.

The purpose of this investigation was to compare the ability of nurses and parents to detect speech and language disability. The methodology included development and validation of a parent questionnaire to detect speech and language disability in 398 3-year-old English-speaking children. The parent questionnaire and a standard developmental screen administered by child health nurses were compared with a gold standard (a speech and language assessment). International criteria for screening tools were applied. The tools were comparable in performance. A simple parent questionnaire, completed without professional assistance, was a viable alternative to professional screening. Parents' education and parity had no influence on their ability to detect language disorders. Although size of sibship had no association with the occurrence of speech and language disability, third-born children were more likely to have a speech and language disability than any other birth order.

Child, Preschool↗

PubMed2000

Comprehension and production of gestures by children with normal and impaired language at ages 4, 5, and 6.

12 children with normal verbal language, ages 4, 5, and 6, were matched with 12 children with impaired verbal language. When the two groups were compared for comprehension and production of nonverbal gestures as well as verbal language, the latter group scored more poorly in both areas. Implications for speech-language pathologists and other professionals in the assessment and remediation of language in language-impaired children are mentioned.

Age Factors↗

PubMed1982

Validation of an early language milestone scale in a high-risk population.

Detailed language evaluations were obtained by interviewing the parents of 191 healthy children aged 0 to 3 years, and by testing the children themselves. From these data, normative values were derived for 41 language milestones in the first 36 months of life. These values were used to construct the Early Language Milestone Scale (ELM Scale), a brief language assessment tool suitable for use by general pediatricians. Physician use of the ELM Scale in a population of 119 children considered at high risk for the presence of developmental disability yielded 97% sensitivity and 93% specificity for the ELM Scale as a detector of developmentally delayed children, when compared with more formal developmental measures as applied by a clinical psychologist or speech pathologist. Early language milestones are a sensitive indicator of developmental integrity; delayed achievement of early language milestones strongly suggests the presence of a significant underlying developmental disability. The ELM Scale may be adopted as a valid measure of developmental status among children considred at high risk for the presence of developmental disabilities.

Cerebral Palsy↗

PubMed2004

Speech, language, and reading skills after early cochlear implantation.

OBJECTIVE: To examine whether age at cochlear implantation or duration of implant use is associated with speech, language, and reading skills exhibited at age 8 to 9 years in children who underwent implantation by age 5 years. DESIGN: Performance outcomes in speech perception, speech production, language, and reading were examined in terms of the age at which children first received a cochlear implant (2, 3, or 4 years), the age they received an updated (Spectra) processor, and the duration of use of an implant and an updated processor. SETTING: Data collection was conducted at summer research camps held over 4 consecutive years to maximize the number of children available at a specific age (8-9 years). Children were tested individually by experienced examiners, and their parents and therapists provided background and educational history information. PARTICIPANTS: A total of 181 children from 33 different states and 5 Canadian provinces who received a cochlear implant by age 5 years were tested. A subsample of 133 children with performance IQ scores of 80 or greater and onset of deafness at birth were selected for the age-at-implantation analysis. Another subsample of 39 children with deafness acquired by age 3 years was also examined. OUTCOME MEASURES: A battery of tests of speech perception, speech production, language, and reading was administered to each child and reduced to a single factor score for each skill. RESULTS: Correlation coefficients between age at implantation and duration of use did not reach significance for any of the outcome skills measured. Age at which the updated speech processor (Spectra) was fitted was significantly related to speech production outcome (earlier use of an updated processor was associated with greater speech intelligibility) but not to any other skill area. However, more of the children who underwent implantation at age 2 years (43%) achieved combined speech and language skills commensurate with their age-matched peers with normal hearing than did children who underwent implantation at age 4 years (16%). Furthermore, normal speech and language skills were documented in 80% of children who lost hearing after birth and who underwent implantation within a year of onset of deafness. CONCLUSIONS: For children who receive a cochlear implant between the ages of 2 and 4 years, early cochlear implantation does not ensure better speech perception, speech production, language, or reading skills. However, greater speech and language proficiency may be expected from children who exhibit normal hearing for even a brief period after birth and receive a cochlear implant shortly after losing their hearing. Further research examining the benefits of cochlear implantation before age 2 years will help families and clinicians better understand the time-sensitive nature of the decision to conduct cochlear implant surgery.

Age Factors↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Dyslexia and the learning of a foreign language in school: where are we going?

The difficulties which many dyslexic students encounter in the learning of the English language often extend to the learning of a foreign language in school. Although this problem has been acknowledged for some time, and although the learning of a modern foreign language is a core element in the Scottish curriculum, there has been little research into how modern languages can be presented to offer the best learning opportunities to dyslexic students. Dyslexic students are likely to benefit from a multisensory approach to the learning of a modern foreign language, and it seems likely that they will need to utilize similar strategies to those used for learning their first language. Strategies are discussed with a view to making modern language learning more appropriate for students with difficulties in learning.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2005

Speech and language therapy for dysarthria due to non-progressive brain damage.

BACKGROUND: Dysarthria is a common sequel of non-progressive brain damage (typically stroke and traumatic brain damage). Impairment-based therapy and a wide variety of compensatory management strategies are undertaken by speech and language therapists with this patient population. OBJECTIVES: To determine the efficacy of speech and language therapy interventions for adults with dysarthria following non-progressive brain damage. SEARCH STRATEGY: We searched the trials registers of the following Cochrane Groups: Stroke, Injuries, Movement Disorders and Infectious Diseases. We also searched the trials register of the Cochrane Rehabilitation and Related Therapies Field. The trials registers were last searched in September 2004. The Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL) (The Cochrane Library Issue 2, 2004), MEDLINE (1966 to September 2004), EMBASE (1980 to September 2004), CINAHL (1983 to September 2004), PsycINFO (1974 to October 2004), and Linguistics and Language Behavior Abstracts (1983 to December 2004) were searched electronically. We handsearched the International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders (1966 to 2005, Issue 1) and selected conference proceedings, and scanned the reference lists of relevant articles. We approached colleagues and speech and language therapy training institutions to identify other possible published and unpublished studies. SELECTION CRITERIA: Unconfounded randomised controlled trials (RCTs). DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS: One author assessed trial quality. Two co-authors were available to examine any potential trials for possible inclusion in the review. MAIN RESULTS: No trials of the required standard were identified. AUTHORS' CONCLUSIONS: There is no evidence of the quality required by this review to support or refute the effectiveness of speech and language therapy interventions for dysarthria following non-progressive brain damage. Despite the recent commencement of a RCT of optimised speech and language therapy for communication difficulties after stroke, there continues to be an urgent need for good quality research in this area.

Adult↗

PubMed2000

Sign language tics in a prelingually deaf man.

Gilles de la Tourette syndrome is characterized by vocal and motor tics starting in childhood. Vocal tics may be either noises or words, and the vocal language tics may consist of obscenities (coprolalia) and repetitions of speech that has been heard (echolalia). We describe a prelingually deaf man who has the full array of tics seen in Gilles de la Tourette syndrome, but in whom vocal language tics are replaced by equivalent sign language tics. This is, to our knowledge, the first report of sign language tics in a person with prelingual deafness. The implications of this phenomenon for the separation between language and ideas in tics and the equivalence of sign language to spoken language is discussed.

Adult↗

PubMed1989

Genetic differences among language families in Europe.

We investigated whether 59 allele frequencies and 10 cranial variables differed among speakers of the 12 modern language families in Europe. Although this is a classical analysis of variance design, special techniques had to be developed for the analysis because of spatial autocorrelation of both biological and language data. The method examines pooled sums of squares within language families. These are compared with the same quantities obtained by randomly partitioning the available data points in Europe into internally cohesive subsets representing the same sample sizes for each language family as in the originally observed data. Our results suggest that for numerous genetic systems, population samples differ more among language families than they do within families. These findings are considered in relation to two contrasting models: a model of random spatial differentiation of gene frequencies unrelated to language and a model of aboriginal genetic differences among speakers of different language groups. Our observed findings suggest partial validity of both models.

Alleles↗

PubMed2002

Abnormal asymmetry in language association cortex in autism.

Autism is a neurodevelopmental disorder affecting cognitive, language, and social functioning. Although language and social communication abnormalities are characteristic, prior structural imaging studies have not examined language-related cortex in autistic and control subjects. Subjects included 16 boys with autism (aged 7-11 years), with nonverbal IQ greater than 80, and 15 age- and handedness-matched controls. Magnetic resonance brain images were segmented into gray and white matter; cerebral cortex was parcellated into 48 gyral-based divisions per hemisphere. Asymmetry was assessed a priori in language-related inferior lateral frontal and posterior superior temporal regions and assessed post hoc in all regions to determine specificity of asymmetry abnormalities. Boys with autism had significant asymmetry reversal in frontal language-related cortex: 27% larger on the right in autism and 17% larger on the left in controls. Only one additional region had significant asymmetry differences on post hoc analysis: posterior temporal fusiform gyrus (more left-sided in autism), whereas adjacent fusiform gyrus and temporooccipital inferior temporal gyrus both approached significance (more right-sided in autism). These inferior temporal regions are involved in visual face processing. In boys with autism, language and social/face processing-related regions displayed abnormal asymmetry. These structural abnormalities may relate to language and social disturbances observed in autism.

Autistic Disorder↗

PubMed1995

Selective deficit of one language in a bilingual patient following surgery in the left perisylvian area.

We report on a right-handed bilingual patient with a left perisylvian arteriovenous malformation that caused a mild naming deficit evident only on formal language testing in both languages. Sodium amytal injected in the left carotid artery (Wada test) before surgery resulted in speech arrest for both languages. Following surgery for removal of the lesion she developed additional deficits in her native language without alteration in her second language. Selective impairment in one language after surgery demonstrates that each language has different anatomical representation within the perisylvian dominant area.

Adult↗

PubMed1998

Brain organization of language after early unilateral lesion: a PET study.

Neuropsychological studies suggest that good long-term language outcome is possible following extensive early left-hemisphere damage. We explored the brain organization for language in children with early unilateral lesion, using [15O]-water PET. In 12 patients with left lesion (LL) and 9 patients with right lesion (RL), cerebral blood flow changes during listening to sentences and repetition were studied. A rightward shift of language activations in the LL group was found in perisylvian areas and multiple other, mostly temporo-parietal, regions. The hypothesis of intrahemispheric reorganization in the LL group found only limited support. The number of activated regions was overall greater in the RL group. Unexpected findings included a stronger subcortical and cerebellar language involvement in the RL group. We suggest that (a) early left lesion is associated with enhanced language participation of the right hemisphere in and beyond the classical language areas, and (b) postlesional effects are in part additive (recruitment of noncanonical areas), in part subtractive (functional depression in areas normally involved in language).

Adolescent↗

PubMed2002

Reproducibility of fMRI-determined language lateralization in individual subjects.

This study investigated within-subject test-retest reproducibility (i.e., reliability) of language lateralization obtained with fMRI. Nine healthy subjects performed the same set of three different language tasks during two fMRI sessions on separate days (verb generation, antonym generation, and picture naming). A fourth task analysis was added in which the three tasks were analyzed conjointly (combined task analysis, CTA). The CTA targets brain areas that are commonly used in different language tasks, aiming more selectively at language-critical structures. The number of active voxels (i.e., robustness) and calculated lateralization index (LI) were compared across sessions, tasks, subjects, and two a priori defined volumes of interest (classical language regions versus whole hemisphere) for a wide range of statistical thresholds. Robustness and reliability strongly varied between task analyses. The CTA was a robust detector of language-related brain activity, in contrast to the single task approaches. The CTA and verb generation task allowed for reliable calculation of the LI. Higher thresholds yielded a clear increase in left lateralization, which was largest when calculated from active voxels in classical language regions.

Adult↗

PubMed1996

Is there any intermediate stage between animal communication and language?

Animal communication and human language have fundamental differences in their structures and functions. Furthermore, there is no living species demonstrating an intermediate stage of language evolution. Thus, we have difficulty in finding characteristics attributable to a communication system which can already be considered as a starting point for linguistic evolution. However, some findings coming from neurolinguistic research give us the opportunity to suppose that varying and arranging linguistic elements can be detached from other grammatical functions. Further information in this direction comes from apes' language-teaching experiments; namely bonobos (Pan paniscus) are able to understand and produce differences in meaning by varying word arrangements. Based on these results one can suppose that an acoustic signal system, which possesses discrete units for variable use, might be very ancient and might exist independent and prior to a more advanced language state. In the natural setting, acoustic territorial marking behaviour is exposed to selection pressure to elaborate sign systems built up from discrete, variable units. In addition to the well-known territorial bird songs, some monkey species and all species of lesser apes have territorial songs fitting these criteria. The analyses of the so-called long calls in chimpanzees and bonobos make it likely that the group-living great apes preserved the ability to create syntactically different calls, which would be developed by requirements of social life. A call repertoire emerged in these species, which contained a large number of call variants at group level available for each group member via social learning. This type of animal call is different from ordinary animal communication; it shows some features of human language. It can represent an intermediate stage between animal communication and language, and communication systems similar to this one can be considered as a starting point or first stage of language evolution.

Animal Communication↗

PubMed1989

Behavioral correlates of developmental expressive language disorder.

The association of behavior problems with preschool language disorders has been documented extensively. However, researchers have typically failed to differentiate subgroups of language-impaired children, to use observational data in documenting the behavior disorders, or to study children at the youngest ages. Using a multimodal assessment, this study examined parent-child interaction and behavior problems in a clearly defined subgroup of language-impaired children, those with developmental expressive language disorder (ELD). These children exhibit a delay in expressive language compared with receptive language and nonverbal cognitive skills. Subjects were identified and studied at the youngest age at which the disorder can be assessed. A group of ELD children, averaging 27 months of age, was contrasted with a group of normally developing children, matched for age, sex, and receptive language ability. Groups were compared on observed parent-child interactions as well as maternal responses on the Parenting Stress Index, the Eyberg Child Behavior Inventory, and a behavior-related structured interview. ELD children, when compared with normally developing children, exhibited higher levels of negative behavior and were perceived as different by their parents.

Child Behavior Disorders↗

PubMed2002

Determination of hemisphere dominance for language: comparison of frontal and temporal fMRI activation with intracarotid amytal testing.

The reliability of frontal and temporal fMRI activations for the determination of hemisphere language dominance was evaluated in comparison with intracarotid amytal testing (IAT). Twenty-two patients were studied by IAT (bilateral in 13, unilateral in 9 patients) and fMRI using a paradigm requiring semantic decisions. Global and regional (frontal and temporoparietal) lateralisation indices (LI) were calculated from the number of activated (r>0.4) voxels in both hemispheres. Frontolateral activations associated with the language task were seen in all patients, temporoparietal activations in 20 of 22. Regional LI corresponded better with IAT results than global LI. Frontolateral LI were consistent with IAT in all patients with bilateral IAT (including three patients with right dominant and one patient with bilateral language representation) and were not conflicting in any of the patients with unilateral IAT. Temporoparietal LI were discordant with IAT in two patients with atypical language representation. In the determination of hemisphere dominance for language, regional analysis of fMRI activation is superior to global analysis. In cases with clear-cut fMRI lateralisation, i.e. consistent lateralised activation of frontal and temporoparietal language zones, IAT may be unnecessary. FMRI should be performed prior to IAT in all patients going to be operated in brain regions potentially involved in language.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2003

Bifurcation analysis of the fully symmetric language dynamical equation.

In this paper, I study a continuous dynamical system that describes language acquisition and communication in a group of individuals. Children inherit from their parents a mechanism to learn their language. This mechanism is constrained by a universal grammar which specifies a restricted set of candidate languages. Language acquisition is not error-free. Children may or may not succeed in acquiring exactly the language of their parents. Individuals talk to each other, and successful communication contributes to biological (or cultural) fitness. I provide a full bifurcation analysis of the case where the parameters are chosen to yield a highly symmetric dynamical system. Populations approach either an incoherent steady state, where many different candidate languages are represented in the population, or a coherent steady state, where the majority of the population speaks a single language. The main result of the paper is a description of how learning reliability affects the stability of these two kinds of equilibria. I rigorously find all fixed points, determine their stabilities, and prove that all populations tend to some fixed point. I also demonstrate that the fixed point representing an incoherent steady state becomes unstable in an S (n)-symmetric transcritical bifurcation as learning becomes more reliable.

Child↗

PubMed2000

Epidemiology and prognosis of specific disorders of language and scholastic skills.

Data from a prospective longitudinal study on the development of children born at biological and psychosocial risk were utilised to examine language and learning abilities of 320 children at ages 4.5 and 8 years. Following the research criteria of the ICD-10, specific developmental disorders of speech and language and specific developmental disorders of scholastic skills were diagnosed. Data were also provided for a clinical and general low achievement group according to less stringent criteria. Frequencies in the risk population were low for specific disorders (ICD-10) (0.6%-3.7% depending on age and type of disorder). Higher frequencies were found when a clinical definition (0.6%-13.6%) or overall low achievement score (0.6%-18.6%) was chosen. The impact of well-documented organic and psychosocial risks was analysed. Organic risk affected language abilities at 4.5 years of age but neither language nor learning abilities at 8 years of age. Psychosocial aspects of a child's environment proved to be associated with both specific language and learning abilities. Stability of language disorders, association between language and reading/spelling disorders as well as gender effects were investigated.

Achievement↗

PubMed2007

Analogy between language and biology: a functional approach.

We adopt here a functional approach to the classical comparison between language and biology. We first parallel events which have a functional signification in each domain, by matching the utterance of a sentence with the release of a protein. The meaning of a protein is then defined by analogy as "the constant contribution of the biochemical material composing the protein to the effects produced by any release of the protein". The proteome of an organism corresponds to an I-language (the idiolect of an individual), and the proteome of a species is equivalent to an E-language (a language in the common sense). Proteins and sentences are both characterized by a complex hierarchical structure, but the language property of 'double articulation' has no equivalent in the biological domain in this analogy, contrary to previous proposals centered on the genetic code. Besides, the same intimate relation between structure and meaning holds in both cases (syntactic structure for sentences and three-dimensional conformation for proteins). An important disanalogy comes from the combinatorial power of language which is not shared by the proteome as a whole, but it must be noted that the immune system possesses interesting properties in this respect. Regarding evolutionary aspects, the analogy still works to a certain extent. Languages and proteomes can be both considered as belonging to a general class of systems, that we call "productive self-reproductive systems", characterized by the presence of two dynamics: a fast dynamics in an external domain where functional events occur (productive aspect), and a slow dynamics responsible for the evolution of the system itself, driven by the feed-back of events related to the reproduction process.

Animals↗