Cognitive functions in preschool children with specific language impairment

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• 作者：Katrin Reichenbach ; ^{katrin.reichenbach@fu-berlin.de" class="auth_mail" title="E-mail the corresponding author} ; Laura Bastian ; Saskia Rohrbach ; Manfred Gross ; Lea Sarrar
• 关键词：Specific language impairment ; Preschool children ; Cognitive functions ; Executive functions ; Cognitive flexibility ; Inhibition
• 刊名：International Journal of Pediatric Otorhinolaryngology
• 出版年：2016
• 出版时间：July 2016
• 年：2016
• 卷：86
• 期：Complete
• 页码：22-26
• 全文大小：267 K

文摘

A growing body of research has focused on executive functions in children with specific language impairment (SLI). However, results show limited convergence, particularly in preschool age. The current neuropsychological study compared performance of cognitive functions focused on executive components and working memory in preschool children with SLI to typically developing controls.

Method

Performance on the measures cognitive flexibility, inhibition, processing speed and phonological short-term memory was assessed. The monolingual, Caucasian study sample consisted of 30 children with SLI (M_age = 63.3 months, SD = 4.3 months) and 30 healthy controls (M_age = 62.2 months, SD = 3.7 months). Groups were matched for age and nonverbal IQ. Socioeconomic status of the participating families was included.

Results

Children with SLI had significantly poorer abilities of phonological short-term memory than matched controls. A tendency of poorer abilities in the SLI group was found for inhibition and processing speed.

Conclusions

We confirmed phonological short-term memory to be a reliable marker of SLI in preschoolers. Our results do not give definite support for impaired executive function in SLI, possibly owing to limited sensitivity of test instruments in this age group. We argue for a standardization of executive function tests for research use.