The emergence of clause construction in children who use speech generating devices.

ABSTRACT: This study aimed to detect patterns in clause construction structural changes produced by four participants aged 9;5-13;7 (years;months) with motor speech disorders who used speech-generating devices. Sequences of adult-child interactions, drawn from the data of a larger study focused on enhancing vocabulary and grammar skills, were examined. This current study comprises a secondary analysis of a corpus of 29 conversations totalling 808.36 min, analysing clause structures by type, linguistic complexity, and intensity of adult prompts (number of turns). Results show that, over time, the participants' clause structure complexity increased through addition of phrase-internal elements such as inflections, articles, and prepositions. Use of specific grammatical elements followed the development

SUBMITTER: Savaldi-Harussi G 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7338835 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature