Children with pre- or perinatal unilateral brain lesions (PL) exhibit marked plasticity for language functions. However, they still do have problems with delays in productive and receptive language. For some the delays are not permanent while they are for others. The researchers in this instance wanted to know if early child gesture can be used to predict subsequent vocabulary development in children with PL. If this is the case, then gesturing can be a potential early indicatior of which children with PL will experience language delays later on. Speech and gestures have been related in previous studies. Children usually begin communicating with gestures, which are then replaced with speech later on.
The participants for the research were 11 children with PL studied longitudinally between 10 and 30 months. All children were observed in their home for 90 minutes while interacting naturally with their primary caregivers at 18,22, and 26 months. All child speech produced during each videotaped session was transcribed. Any communicative hand movement that did not involve direct manipulation of objects (e.g., twisting a jar open) or a ritualized game (e.g., patty cake) was considered a gesture.
They found that children with PL experience language delays that vary in terms of their severity and their persistence over time. They also found that this variability was related to later vocabulary levels–– the children who produced fewer gesture types at 18 months were just the children who exhibited lower scores on productive and receptive vocabulary measures at 30 months. Despite the fact that the children with PL varied widely in the location, size, and type of lesion they sustained, their early gestures were a reliable index of their later productive and receptive language skills.
Sauer, E., Levine, S. C., & Goldin-Meadow, S. (2010). Early Gesture Predicts Language Delay in Children With Pre- or Perinatal Brain Lesions. Child Development, 81(2), 528-539. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8624.2009.01413.x
Not a brain journal.
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