Linguistic competence in paediatric closed head injury

Abstract

The purpose of this investigation was to examine the effects of age at onset of traumatic brain injury on the linguistic competence of children and adolescents who sustained closed head injuries (CHI) that cause diffuse brain damage. The Test of Language Competence-Expanded Edition (TLC-E), a standardized test of subtle language abilities, was administered to 20 children who sustained severe CHI. The study determined whether 10 subjects who experienced CHI at a pre-adolescent age (4 to 11 years) and 10 subjects who experienced CHI at an adolescent age (13 to 18 years) showed quantitative differences in linguistic competence as measured by the TLC-E Test. The language abilities of children in both groups were compared to determine whether there were trends in performance relative to age of onset or type of subtest. In addition, experimental subjects' performance was compared to the normative population used to standardize the TLC-E. Hypotheses were constructed according to separate developmental and pathophysiological perspectives.

Predictors of longitudinal outcome and recovery of pragmatic language and its relation to externalizing behaviour after pediatric traumatic brain injury

“…Ageadjusted standard scores were calculated and employed for statistical analyses (M = 10; SD = 3). In keeping with the approach adopted in previous studies Farina, Albanese, & Pons, 2007;Hallett, 1997;Taylor et al, 2014), this test was designed to measure language pragmatics, as distinct from other domains of metalinguistic competence assessed using the TLC-E, such as language semantics and syntax (Dennis & Barnes, 1990). …”

Recommendations for the Use of Common Outcome Measures in Pediatric Traumatic Brain Injury Research

“…The TLC-E (Wiig and Secord, 1989) was designed as a test of pragmatic language use, including production of context-appropriate sentences and comprehension of idioms. Although some of the idioms are no longer in current usage, the TLC-E has shown discriminant validity for children and adolescents with TBI in previous research (Dennis and Barnes, 1990;Hallett, 1997;Towne and Entwisle, 1993). Administration time is * 45-60 min.…”

Children's Spatial Behavior is Differentially Affected After Traumatic Brain Injury

“…While general neuropsychological sequelae of TBI have been well described (Bowen et al, 1997;Cattelani, Lombardi, Brianti, & Mazzucchi, 1998;Ewing-Cobbs et al, 1997;Massagli et al, 1996) and while the effects of TBI on some cognitive functions such as language (Barnes, Dennis, & Wilkinson, 1999;Hallett, 1997;Jordan & Murdoch, 1993), attention (Catroppa, Anderson, & Stargatt, 1999;Ewing-Cobbs, Fletcher, Levin, Miner, & Eisenberg, 1998;Kaufmann, Fletcher, Levin, Miner, & Ewing-Cobbs, 1993), memory (Roman et al, 1998;Yeates, Blumenstein, Patterson, & Delis, 1995), and executive functions (Levin, Fletcher, et al, 1996;Levin, Song, et al, 1997) have been extensively studied, little research has been conducted into spatial functioning after TBI. This is a matter of concern, because spatial abilities have been a major topic of research in developmental psychology for the last two decades.…”