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Journal ArticleDOI

The relation of utterance length to grammatical complexity in normal and language-disordered groups

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TLDR
In this article, the mean length of utterance (MLU) in morphemes was examined as a predictor of grammatical complexity of natural language corpora of normal preschoolers and of children and adolescents with delayed language, Fragile X syndrome, Down syndrome, and autism.
Abstract
Mean length of utterance (MLU) in morphemes was examined as a predictor of the grammatical complexity of natural language corpora of normal preschoolers and of children and adolescents with delayed language, Fragile X syndrome, Down syndrome, and autism. The Index of Productive Syntax (IPSyn) served as the measure of syntactic and morphological proficiency. For all groups, a strong curvilinear association between measures was found across the MLU range from 1.0 to about 4.5. Correlations were weaker when MLU exceeded 3.0 than during earlier stages of language development, however, confirming previous suggestions that MLU becomes less closely associated with grammatical development as linguistic proficiency increases. For the language-disordered groups, moreover, the curves relating the two measures differed from the curves for the normal preschoolers because MLU frequently overestimated actual IPSyn scores. The results are discussed with respect to the use of MLU in conjunction with other measures of syntactic complexity in the study of atypical language development.

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Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI

Language input and child syntax

TL;DR: Later syntactic development in children is examined and substantial individual differences in children's mastery of multiclause sentences are found and a significant relation between those differences and the proportion of multicLause sentences in parent speech is found.
OtherDOI

Language and communication in autism

TL;DR: This article found that autistic children start using words around age 1 and develop conversational ability by 18 to 24 months, and that articulation, word use, syntax and morphology, echolalia (repetition with similar intonation of words/phrases someone else has said), and confusion of personal pronouns are affected.
Journal ArticleDOI

Index of Productive Syntax.

TL;DR: In this article, a new method for evaluating the grammatical complexity of preschool natural language corpora is introduced, based on the Index of Productive Syntax, where occurrences of 56 syntactic and morphological forms are counted, yielding a total score and subscores for noun phrases, verb phrases, questions/negations, and sentence structures.
Journal ArticleDOI

Language acquisition in autism spectrum disorders: A developmental review.

TL;DR: The authors provide an overview of the current state of knowledge of language acquisition in autism spectrum disorders, also noting gaps in our current knowledge, and discuss some promising future directions for typical language acquisition.
Journal ArticleDOI

Phonological Working Memory and Speech Production in Preschool Children

TL;DR: Significant differences were found, with children of good phonological memory abilities producing language that was more grammatically complex, contained a richer array of words, and included longer utterances than children of poor phonologicalMemory abilities.
References
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Book

A First Language: The Early Stages

TL;DR: This article studied the early stages of grammatical constructions and the meanings they convey in pre-school children and found that the order of their acquisition is almost identical across children and is predicted by their relative semantic and grammatical complexity.
Book

Handbook of Autism and Pervasive Developmental Disorders

TL;DR: In this article, a sibling's perspective on the diagnosis of Rett's syndrome is presented. But the authors focus on the development and social development of individuals with autism and do not address the social aspects of the disorder.
Trending Questions (1)
What is the relationship between the occurrence of new words and the Complexity of utterance?

The provided paper does not discuss the relationship between the occurrence of new words and the complexity of utterance.