Toward an Understanding of Developmental Language Disorder in Adults: Investigating the Relationship Between Cognitive Abilities and Linguistic Outcomes.

Purpose: There is a growing body of research on developmental language disorder (DLD), but very few studies have focused on the role of cognitive abilities in adulthood. The present study explored the relationship between cognition and language in adults with and without DLD. Method: Sixty participa...

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Publicado en:Journal of Speech, Language & Hearing Research Vol. 68; no. 8; pp. 3895 - 3919
Autores principales: Blake, Ashley, Dąbrowska, Ewa, Llompart, Miquel
Formato: Artículo
Publicado: American Speech-Language-Hearing Association Aug2025
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Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
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      dt: Aug2025
      vid: 68
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      pub: American Speech-Language-Hearing Association
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        10.1044/2025_JSLHR-24-00557
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        atl: Toward an Understanding of Developmental Language Disorder in Adults: Investigating the Relationship Between Cognitive Abilities and Linguistic Outcomes.
      aug:
        au:
          Blake, Ashley
          Dąbrowska, Ewa
          Llompart, Miquel
        affil:
          Department of Linguistics and Communication, University of Birmingham, United Kingdom
          Department of English and American Studies, Friedrich-Alexander University, Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany
          Department of Translation and Language Sciences, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain
      su:
        Intellect
        Task performance
        Linguistics
        Language disorders
        Vocabulary
        Cognition
        Language acquisition
        Adults
        Research funding
        Grammar
        Cognitive processing speed
        Questionnaires
        Multiple regression analysis
        Descriptive statistics
        Physiological aspects of speech
        Research
        Speech evaluation
        Comparative studies
        Reaction time
        Automation
      sug:
        subj:
          Intellect
          Task performance
          Linguistics
          Language disorders
          Vocabulary
          Cognition
          Language acquisition
          Adults
          Research funding
          Grammar
          Cognitive processing speed
          Questionnaires
          Multiple regression analysis
          Descriptive statistics
          Physiological aspects of speech
          Research
          Speech evaluation
          Comparative studies
          Reaction time
          Automation
      ab: Purpose: There is a growing body of research on developmental language disorder (DLD), but very few studies have focused on the role of cognitive abilities in adulthood. The present study explored the relationship between cognition and language in adults with and without DLD. Method: Sixty participants, 30 language typical (LT) adults and 30 with DLD, completed a battery of online cognitive and language assessments. Cognitive tasks included language analytic ability (the ability to recognize the grammatical functions of sentence elements), nonverbal IQ, explicit learning of form-meaning pairings, implicit statistical learning, and speed of automatization. Language assessments included two grammar tasks (assessing morphosyntax) and vocabulary. Accuracy and reaction time measures were obtained for all tasks. Results: Between-group differences demonstrated that language remains an area of difficulty for adults with DLD. Language analytic ability was a significant predictor of grammatical and vocabulary knowledge in the LT group and of grammar in the DLD group. In addition, we found that explicit learning of form-meaning pairings predicted linguistic outcomes in adults with DLD. We found small or no differences for all the other cognitive abilities; this is in line with previous studies that report a relative "catch up" in cognitive abilities in adults with DLD. Response times for the DLD group were slower in both linguistic and nonlinguistic tasks. Conclusions: Our results demonstrate that language difficulties in DLD persist into adulthood. Regarding cognitive measures, we show that language analytic ability is a key predictor of linguistic outcomes in both groups, and explicit learning of form-meaning pairings predicts grammar and vocabulary in the DLD group. These findings have important implications for clinical interventions, as they suggest that both implicit (fast, effortless, and unconscious) and explicit (slow, effortful, and conscious) processes are relevant to language. In addition, adults with DLD may require additional processing time in cognitive and linguistic tasks.
      pubtype: Academic Journal
      doctype: Article
      src: R
    language: English
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