DLD and Prosocial Skills
Aim of the paper:
Our aim was to look at how children with DLD develop prosocial skills and compare their prosocial skill development to children without DLD. We looked at how prosocial skills developed from age 5 to 11. We then looked at social, behavioural and emotional outcomes at age 11 in children with DLD. We looked at these outcomes when considering different types of prosocial development in childhood.
Findings
Individuals with SLI have lower reading accuracy and comprehension skills than typically developing peers, and they remain at the same lower level of relative ability from age 7 to 16 years. That is, they do not catch up, nor do they fall further behind their peers who do not have SLI.
Individuals with SLI exhibit a nonlinear trajectory of reading development, meaning more rapid growth in childhood followed by a slowing down in reading skills during adolescence.
Individuals with SLI who start as poor readers are likely to continue to have reading difficulties throughout their childhood and adolescence, thereby emphasising the need for early assessment of reading and early identification of reading difficulties in children.
Autistic symptomatology and reading skills
Whilst individuals with SLI and ASD exhibited reading accuracy skills lower than typically developing children, they had average scores that fell within the normal range. In contrast, individuals with SLI only showed deficits in this area.
Both individuals with SLI only and individuals with both SLI and ASD had similar deficits in reading comprehension.
Project Details
Lead researcher - St. Michelle C. Clair, Kevin Durkin, Gina Conti‐Ramsden
Institution - University of Bath
First published - 23rd December 2010