Jean Piaget's ideas regarding symbolic function are expanded in this paper to provide a model to use in distinguishing between general symbolic versus specific linguistic deficits in language disordered children (whose disorders are not due primarily to intellectual, sensory, motor, or social-emotional deficits). In applying this model to the…

A study made to examine the development in production of the English verbal auxiliary and copula (VAC) "to be" compared a group of children with language dysfunction and a group of normal children. Two purposes were to see whether developmental differences are qualitative or quantitative and to calculate the importance of the VAC in language…

Attempts to demonstrate that specifically language-impaired (SLI) children can be viewed as normal learners faced with systematically altered input. By assuming SLI children are limited in their ability to perceive and hypothesize grammatical morphemes that are low in phonetic substance, many features of SLI children's language can be explained by…

This study of 80 autistic (ages 6-18), mentally handicapped, and normal children found that more autistic subjects used neologisms and idiosyncratic language than age- and language-skill-matched control groups. More autistic children used words inappropriately that were neither phonologically nor conceptually related to intended English words than…

Examined oset and acquisition of language comprehension and production in a language delayed child through analysis of a daily diary. In addition to confirming that the gap between comprehension and production was greater than that found in normal children, data from these observations can also be used to add to a general understanding of the…

Comparison of language-impaired two- to three-year-olds (N=10) and normal one-year-olds (N=15) matched for expressive language revealed that the language-impaired subjects acquired a greater number of object concepts presented in a no-action condition than the normal children, although language-impaired subjects' extensions of the names to new…

This article on sampling early semantic productions reports a study of 6 children (ages 31-35 months) with specific language impairments. Subjects produced a greater frequency and diversity of multiword utterances in a free-play sampling situation than in a joint action routine sampling situation. (JDD)

This paper presents the case of a child who at age 3;3 showed a marked schism between two branches of language functioning; he had control of language as a system for expressing syntactic-semantic relations but not as a system of interpersonal communication. (CFM)

The strengths and weaknesses that characterize language tests and measures used with young school-aged children are reviewed. Suggestions are given to assist school psychologists in testing children formally and informally and in working in conjunction with speech-language pathologists. (SLD)

This collection of abstracts is part of a continuing series providing information on recent doctoral dissertations. The 23 titles deal with the following topics: sex appropriate and sex inappropriate language; lexical retrieval and perceptual errors; naming deficits in anomia and aphasia; developmental discourse; pragmatic information and…

This is the second report of a longitudinal project, initiated in 1970, in which children with and without language problems are identified in French immersion and English kindergartens and closely monitored to the end of grade 3. This study investigates the desirability of early French immersion program for English-speaking children with language…