Effects of verb familiarity on finiteness marking in children with specific language impairment.

ABSTRACT:

Purpose

Children with specific language impairment (SLI) have known deficits in the verb lexicon and finiteness marking. This study investigated a potential relationship between these 2 variables in children with SLI and 2 control groups considering predictions from 2 different theoretical perspectives, morphosyntactic versus morphophonological.

Method

Children with SLI, age-equivalent, and language-equivalent (LE) control children (n=59) completed an experimental sentence imitation task that generated estimates of children's finiteness accuracy under 2 levels of verb familiarity--familiar real verbs versus unfamiliar real verbs--in clausal sites marked for finiteness. Imitations were coded and analyzed for overall accuracy as well as finiteness marking and verb root imitati

SUBMITTER: Abel AD 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4398583 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature