Late-talking Children’s Language Development Pattern in the Early Childhood: A Longitudinal Study for Two Years Author:Hsin-Hui Lu, Feng-Ming Tsao
Research Article
The purpose of this study was to examine the language development of late-talkers with language-impairment and late-bloomer from toddlerhood to the preschooler stage. A total of 35 LTs and 34 typically-developing toddlers (TD) provided 3 waves of data at annual intervals beginning at age 2. The LTs were distinguished as those with language disorder (LD, n = 12) and the late bloomers (LB, n = 20) based on their language abilities at age 4. The three groups of children were compared with their language abilities at each time point, and also their language development trajectories from age 2 to age 4. This study had two major findings. First of all, ANOVA analyses the cross-sectional data and HLM analysis the longitudinal data showed that the TDs had better language performance than the LBs, while both groups outperformed the LDs. These findings have verified the proposal of Language Endowment Spectrum. Secondly, the language levels of LT children with LD and LB will improve with early language intervention and kindergarten education. To sum up, the children with LT or LB already show different language development patterns from toddlerhood to the preschooler hood.