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A Comparison of the Age-MLU Relation in Normal and Specifically Language-Impaired Preschool Children

1989; American Speech–Language–Hearing Association; Volume: 54; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1044/jshd.5402.226

2163-6184

Thomas Klee, Mary Schaffer, Susan May, Irene Membrino, Karen Mougey,

Hearing Impairment and Communication

No AccessJournal of Speech and Hearing DisordersResearch Article1 May 1989A Comparison of the Age-MLU Relation in Normal and Specifically Language-Impaired Preschool Children Thomas Klee, Mary Schaffer, Susan May, Irene Membrino, and Karen Mougey Thomas Klee Requests for reprints should be sent to Thomas Klee, Ph.D., Division of Hearing and Speech Sciences, School of Medicine, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN 37232-8700 Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, TN Google Scholar , Mary Schaffer Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, TN Google Scholar , Susan May Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, TN Google Scholar , Irene Membrino Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, TN Google Scholar and Karen Mougey Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, TN Google Scholar https://doi.org/10.1044/jshd.5402.226 SectionsAboutPDF ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationTrack Citations ShareFacebookTwitterLinked In The relation between age and mean length of utterance in morphemes (MLU) was evaluated in a sample of 48 preschool children between 24 and 50 months of age. Twenty-four of these children were diagnosed as having a specific language impairment, and 24 were considered language normal. The groups were matched on age, race, sex, and parental education level. A majority of the children in each group were from lower-middle-class backgrounds. MLU was derived from 20-rain mother-child conversations as the dyad engaged in free play. The results showed that (a) age and MLU were significantly correlated in the normal group (r = .75) and in the group of specifically language-impaired children (r = .77), (b) the predicted MLU of the language-impaired group was lower than that of the normal group across the age range, and (c) the rate of MLU change in each group was similar. The age-MLU relation observed in the lower-middle-class normal children compared favorably to that reported previously for middle- to upper-middle-class children (Miller & Chapman, 1981). 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Leonard Child Language Teaching and Therapy (026565902094536)29 Jul 2020Mean length of utterance among Mandarin-speaking children with and without DLDShang-Yu Wu Volume 54Issue 2May 1989Pages: 226-233 Get Permissions Add to your Mendeley library HistoryReceived: Feb 15, 1988Accepted: Jun 6, 1988 Published in issue: May 1, 1989PubMed ID: 2709841 Metrics Topicsasha-topicsasha-article-typesCopyright & PermissionsCopyright © 1989 American Speech-Language-Hearing AssociationPDF downloadLoading ...