Purpose: Chromosome 16p11.2 deletion syndrome (OMIM #611913) is a rare genetic condition resulting from the partial deletion of approximately 35 genes located at Chromosome 16. Affected people exhibit a variable clinical profile, featuring mild dysmorphisms, motor problems, developmental delay, mild intellectual disability (ID), socialization…

Second-language learners display poorer general language skills in the language used at school than their monolingual peers, which is a concern because general language skills (vocabulary, grammar, language expression, and comprehension) provide the foundation for later academic success. In a randomized controlled trial, we examined the efficacy…

This community effectiveness trial examined the feasibility and efficacy of a comprehensive psychosocial treatment for 28 children, aged 7 to 10 years with high-functioning autism spectrum disorders (HFASDs). Treatment included instruction and therapeutic activities targeting social skills, face-emotion recognition skills, interest expansion, and…

Sentence repetition (SR) tasks have been shown to be excellent indicators of Developmental Language Disorder (DLD). However, there is still no consensus about which core ability they measure: language vs. Verbal Short-Term Memory (VSTM) and Verbal Working Memory (WM). Moreover, very few studies have investigated whether variables predicting SR…

Background: Children with language impairment (LI) show heterogeneity in development. We tracked children from pre-school to middle childhood to characterize three developmental trajectories: resolving, persisting and emerging LI. Methods: We analyzed data from children identified as having preschool LI, or being at family risk of dyslexia,…

The current study examined the role of basic language skills for individual differences in preschoolers' understanding of causal connections. Assessments of basic language skills, expressive vocabulary, phonological processing, and receptive language comprehension were examined in relation to the production of causal connections in a storytelling…

A total of 125 white children from three counties in Georgia (selected as representative of small rural and medium and large industrial urban populations) were administered a battery of tests in three phases of their schooling: (1) during the summer preceding their admission to the first grade, (2) near the end of the first grade, and (3) near the…

This text is designed not only as a teaching text but also as a reference source for students and professionals on the assessment of the cognitive development of children. Chapters address: (1) process challenges of assessing children; (2) context challenges in assessing children; (3) ethical, legal, and professional applications of assessment…

This study, with 161 children with and without language learning problems, tested the hypothesis that as children's language development matures, factor-analytic structural changes occur that are associated with measurements of fine-grained auditory discrimination, receptive vocabulary, receptive language, speech production, and 3 performance…