Specific language impairment in language-minority children from low-income families

in International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders (2014), 49(6), 736-747

Background: Recent evidence suggests that Specific Language Impairment (SLI) might be secondary to general cognitive processing limitations in the domain of executive functioning. Previous research has ... [more ▼]

Background: Recent evidence suggests that Specific Language Impairment (SLI) might be secondary to general cognitive processing limitations in the domain of executive functioning. Previous research has focused almost exclusively on monolingual children with SLI and offers little evidence-based guidance on executive functioning in bilingual children with SLI. Studying bilinguals with SLI is important, especially in the light of increasing evidence that bilingualism can bring advantages in certain domains of executive functioning. Aims: This study seeks to determine whether executive functioning represents an area of difficulty for bilingual language-minority children with SLI and if so, which specific executive processes are affected. Methods and procedures: This cross-cultural research was conducted with bilingual children from Luxembourg and monolingual children from Portugal who all had Portuguese as their first language. The data from 81 eight-year-olds from the following three groups was analyzed: (1) 15 Portuguese-Luxembourgish bilinguals from Luxembourg with an SLI diagnosis; (2) 33 typically developing Portuguese-Luxembourgish bilinguals from Luxembourg; (3) 33 typically developing Portuguese-speaking monolinguals from Portugal. Groups were matched on first language, ethnicity, chronological age and socioeconomic status, and they did not differ in nonverbal intelligence. Children completed a battery of tests tapping: expressive and receptive vocabulary, syntactic comprehension, verbal and visuospatial working memory, selective attention and interference suppression. Results: The bilingual SLI group performed equally well to their typically developing peers on measures of visuospatial working memory but had lower scores than both control groups on tasks of verbal working memory. On measures of selective attention and interference suppression, typically developing children who were bilingual outperformed their monolingual counterparts. For selective attention, performance of the bilingual SLI group did not differ significantly from the controls. For interference suppression the bilingual SLI group performed significantly less well than typically developing bilinguals but not monolinguals. Conclusions and implications: This research provides further support to the position that SLI is not a language-specific disorder. The study indicates that although bilingual children with SLI do not demonstrate the same advantages in selective attention and interference suppression as typically developing bilinguals, they do not lag behind typically developing monolinguals in these domains of executive functioning. This finding raises the possibility that bilingualism might represent a protective factor against some of the cognitive limitations that are associated with SLI in monolinguals. [less ▲]

Can measures of executive function disentangle language disorder and disadvantage

Scientific Conference (2013, June 27)

Identifying specific language impairment (SLI) in polyglots or in children growing up in poverty is complex because it is often difficult to determine whether low language scores are attributable to ... [more ▼]

Identifying specific language impairment (SLI) in polyglots or in children growing up in poverty is complex because it is often difficult to determine whether low language scores are attributable to reduced linguistic exposure or to the presence of a neurolinguistic deficit. This cross-cultural research presents data on different groups of children with an SLI diagnose in Luxembourg, Portugal, and Brazil who all speak Portuguese as their first language and were tested on the same battery of language (expressive/receptive vocabulary and syntactic comprehension) and executive function measures (verbal/visuo-spatial working memory, focused attention, and inhibitory suppression). In Luxembourg, 15 Portuguese-Luxembourgish bilingual 8-year-olds with an SLI diagnose (Bi-SLI) took part in the study. Their performance was compared to 35 typically developing Portuguese-Luxembourgish bilinguals from Luxembourg (Bi-TD) and to 35 typically developing monolinguals from Portugal (Ml-TD). Groups were matched on chronological age, socioeconomic status, and fluid intelligence and all children came from low income families. Results indicate that despite large differences in their language scores (Bi-SLI < Bi-TD < Ml-TD), the groups exhibited comparable performance on the measures of visuo-spatial working memory, focused attention, and inhibitory suppression. Group differences emerged on the verbal working memory measures with Bi-SLI children performing significantly less well than the bilingual and monolingual TD groups that manifested comparable performance. The data seems to suggest that executive function deficits in SLI are not domain general but limited to the verbal domain. Whether these findings extend to monolingual SLI children in Portugal and Brazil will be discussed. [less ▲]

Executive functions in language-minority children with specific language impairment

Poster (2013, May)

This study explored executive function skills and language abilities in bilingual immigrant children with specific language impairment (SLI) from low income families in Luxembourg. Data from 81 eight-year ... [more ▼]

This study explored executive function skills and language abilities in bilingual immigrant children with specific language impairment (SLI) from low income families in Luxembourg. Data from 81 eight-year-olds from three different groups were analyzed: (1) 15 Portuguese-Luxembourgish children with SLI living in Luxembourg (Bi-SLI); (2) 33 typically developing Portuguese-Luxembourgish bilinguals from Luxembourg (Bi-TD); (3) 33 typically developing monolinguals from Portugal (Mo-TD). Groups were matched on first language, chronological age, and socioeconomic status, and did not differ in nonverbal intelligence. All children came from low income families and completed a range of measures tapping verbal and visuospatial working memory, selective attention, interference suppression and different domains of language (syntax and expressive and receptive vocabulary). Results indicate that despite large differences in their language scores (Bi-SLI < Bi-TD < Mo-TD), the groups exhibited comparable performance on the measures of visuospatial working memory, focused attention, and inhibitory suppression. Group differences emerged on the verbal working memory measures with Bi-SLI children performing significantly less well than the bilingual and monolingual typically developing groups that manifested comparable performance. The data suggests that: (a) children with SLI present verbal working memory limitations accompanied by preserved visuospatial executive functioning; (b) the measure that best discriminated the Bi-SLI group from their typically developing peers was the verbal working memory task digit recall. Practical implication for diagnosing SLI in bilingual children from disadvantaged social contexts will be discussed. [less ▲]

Effects of impoverished environmental conditions on working memory performance

in Memory (2013), Mar 26. [Epub ahead of print]

This cross-cultural study investigates the impact of background experience on four verbal and visuo-spatial working memory (WM) tasks. Eighty-four children from low income families were recruited from the ... [more ▼]

This cross-cultural study investigates the impact of background experience on four verbal and visuo-spatial working memory (WM) tasks. Eighty-four children from low income families were recruited from the following groups: (1) Portuguese immigrant children from Luxembourg impoverished in terms of language experience; (2) Brazilian children deprived in terms of scholastic background; (3) Portuguese children from Portugal with no disadvantage in either scholastic or language background. Children were matched on age, gender, fluid intelligence, and socioeconomic status and completed four simple and complex span tasks of WM and a vocabulary measure. Results indicate that despite large differences in their backgrounds and language abilities, the groups exhibited comparable performance on the visuo-spatial tasks dot matrix and odd-one-out and on the verbal simple span task digit recall. Group differences emerged on the verbal complex span task counting recall with children from Luxembourg and Portugal outperforming children from disadvantaged schools in Brazil. The study suggests that whereas contributions of prior knowledge to digit span, dot matrix, and odd-one-out are likely to be minimal, background experience can affect performance on counting recall. Implications for testing WM capacity in children growing up in poverty are discussed. [less ▲]

Bilingualism Enriches the Poor: Enhanced Cognitive Control in Low-Income Minority Children

in Psychological Science (2012), 23(11), 1364-1371

This study explores whether the cognitive advantage associated with bilingualism in executive functioning extends to young children challenged by poverty and if so, which specific processes are most ... [more ▼]

This study explores whether the cognitive advantage associated with bilingualism in executive functioning extends to young children challenged by poverty and if so, which specific processes are most affected. Forty Portuguese-Luxembourgish bilingual children from low-income immigrant families in Luxembourg and 40 matched monolingual children from Portugal completed visuo-spatial tests of working memory, abstract reasoning, selective attention, and interference suppres-sion. Two broad cognitive factors of executive functioning labeled representation (abstract reason-ing and working memory) and control (selective attention and interference suppression) emerged from principal components analysis. Whereas there were no group differences in representation, the bilinguals performed significantly better than the monolinguals in control. These results demon-strate first, that the bilingual advantage is neither confounded with nor limited by socioeconomic and cultural factors and second, that separable aspects of executive functioning are differentially af-fected by bilingualism. The bilingual advantage lies in control but not in visuo-spatial representa-tional processes. [less ▲]