The role of nonverbal working memory in morphosyntactic processing by children with specific language impairment and autism spectrum disorders

Weismer, Susan Ellis; Davidson, M. Meghan; Gangopadhyay, Ishanti; Sindberg, Heidi; Roebuck, Hettie; Kaushanskaya, Margarita

doi:10.1186/s11689-017-9209-6

Cited by 62 publications

(32 citation statements)

References 101 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…Findings related to group differences in the relationship between language and planning performance align with prior work showing differences between children with SLI and TD children in the relationship between language and EF performance, even when overall accuracy between groups is not significantly different on EF tasks (Ellis Weismer et al, 2017;Marton, 2008). Prior research on planning focused on measures of inner speech (verbal mediation) and showed that inner speech in children with SLI was less internalized relative to TD peers, which suggests delayed verbal mediation development (Abdul Aziz et al, 2017;Lidstone et al, 2012).…”

Section: Group Differences In Planningsupporting

confidence: 81%

The Relationship Between Language and Planning in Children With Language Impairment

Larson

Gangopadhyay

Kaushanskaya

et al. 2019

J Speech Lang Hear Res

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Purpose This study examined the relationship between language and planning, a higher order executive function skill, in children with specific language impairment (SLI) and typically developing (TD) children. We hypothesized differences between groups in planning performance and in the role of verbal mediation during planning. Method Thirty-one children with SLI and 50 TD age-matched peers (8–12 years) participated in the study. We assessed language ability via a standardized language measure and planning via a dual-task Tower of London paradigm with 3 conditions: no secondary task (baseline), articulatory suppression secondary task (disrupted verbal mediation), and motor suppression secondary task (control for secondary task demand). Results We found similar overall accuracy between children with SLI and TD peers on the Tower of London. Children with SLI executed trials more slowly at baseline than TD peers but not under articulatory suppression, and children with SLI spent less time planning than TD children at baseline and under articulatory suppression. There was a significant interaction among group, language ability, and planning time under articulatory suppression. Children with SLI who had relatively better language ability spent less time planning than children with SLI who had poorer language ability when verbal mediation was disrupted. This pattern was reversed for TD children. Conclusions This study provides evidence for a relationship between language and planning, yet this relationship differed between children with SLI compared to TD peers. Findings suggest that children with SLI use nonlinguistic perceptual strategies to a greater degree than verbal strategies on visuospatial planning tasks and that intervention might address strategy use for planning.

show abstract

Section: Group Differences In Planningsupporting

confidence: 81%

The Relationship Between Language and Planning in Children With Language Impairment

Larson

Gangopadhyay

Kaushanskaya

et al. 2019

J Speech Lang Hear Res

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…TD monolingual and ASD groups are the focus of this report. Some of these children participated in studies addressing other research questions in prior publications by our research team (e.g., Ellis Weismer et al, 2017;Haebig et al, 2015;Kaushanskaya et al, 2017).…”

Section: Participantsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Executive Function Skills in School-Age Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder: Association With Language Abilities

Weismer

Kaushanskaya

Larson

et al. 2018

J Speech Lang Hear Res

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This article reviews research on executive function (EF) skills in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and the relation between EF and language abilities. The current study assessed EF using nonverbal tasks of inhibition, shifting, and updating of working memory (WM) in school-age children with ASD. It also evaluated the association between children's receptive and expressive language abilities and EF performance. Method: In this study, we sought to address variables that have contributed to inconsistencies in this area of researchincluding task issues, group comparisons, and participant heterogeneity. EF abilities in children with ASD (n = 48) were compared to typically developing controls (n = 71) matched on age, as well as when statistically controlling for group differences in nonverbal cognition, socioeconomic status, and social communication abilities. Six nonverbal EF tasks were administered-2 each to evaluate inhibition, shifting, and WM. Language abilities were assessed via a standardized language measure. Language-EF associations were examined for the ASD group as a whole and subdivided by language status. Results: Children with ASD exhibited significant deficits in all components of EF compared to age-mates and showed particular difficulty with shifting after accounting for group differences in nonverbal cognition. Controlling for social communication-a core deficit in ASD-eliminated group differences in EF performance. A modest association was observed between language (especially comprehension) and EF skills, with some evidence of different patterns between children on the autism spectrum with and without language impairment. Conclusions: There is a need for future research to examine the direction of influence between EF and language. It would be beneficial for EF interventions with children with ASD to consider language outcomes and, conversely, to examine whether specific language training facilitates aspects of executive control in children on the autism spectrum.

show abstract

“…Weismer et al 15 also reported a link between executive function and language in school-age children with DLD. School-age children with language impairment completed both a nonverbal working memory measure and a grammaticality judgment task, and their nonverbal working memory significantly predicted their recognition of grammatical errors.…”

Section: Ellismentioning

confidence: 94%

Variability of Executive Function Performance in Preschoolers with Developmental Language Disorder

Kapa

Erikson

2019

Semin Speech Lang

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Although results vary across individual studies, a large body of evidence suggests that children with developmental language disorder (DLD) have domain-general deficits in executive function compared with peers with typically developing language. Poorer performance for children with DLD has been reported on verbal and nonverbal measures of sustained selective attention, working memory, inhibition, and shifting. However, examination of the variability of task scores among both children with and without DLD reveals a wide range of executive function performance for both groups. Additionally, using executive function scores to classify children into DLD versus typical groups results in classification accuracy that is not clinically useful. This evidence indicates that group-level differences in executive function abilities between children with and without DLD cannot be applied at the individual level. Many children with DLD appear to have intact executive function abilities, which undermines the possibility that poor executive functioning causes language deficits in this population. However, a substantial number of children with DLD also have executive function deficits, and, therefore, therapy approaches with this population should consider both their language and executive function abilities.

show abstract

The role of nonverbal working memory in morphosyntactic processing by children with specific language impairment and autism spectrum disorders

Cited by 62 publications

References 101 publications

The Relationship Between Language and Planning in Children With Language Impairment

The Relationship Between Language and Planning in Children With Language Impairment

Executive Function Skills in School-Age Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder: Association With Language Abilities

Variability of Executive Function Performance in Preschoolers with Developmental Language Disorder

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About