Language-Impaired 4-Year-Olds

TLDR

The study prospectively followed 87 language‑impaired children, assessing them at ages 4, 4½, and 5½ with a comprehensive language battery. By age 5½, 37 % of children (44 % when nonverbal ability was normal) had resolved language disorders, and 90 % of individual outcomes could be predicted at age 4, with story‑retelling ability being the strongest predictor while phonological competence was not related.

Abstract

In a prospective, longitudinal study, 87 language-impaired children were assessed at the ages of 4, 4½, and 5½ years on a battery of language measures. In 37% of children, who were termed the "good outcome group," the language disorder had resolved by the age of 5½ years so that children were indistinguishable from a control group. If one restricted consideration only to those 68 children whose nonverbal ability was within normal limits, the figure rose to 44%. Outcome for individual children (good or poor) could be predicted with 90% accuracy on the basis of test measures obtained at 4 years. The best predictor was ability to tell back a simple story to pictures. The one language measure that did not relate to outcome was phonological competence.