Executive Function Performance in Spanish-Speaking Children With Developmental Language Disorder: Uniformity and Variability.

Purpose: Developmental language disorder (DLD) is often associated with deficits in executive functions (EFs), but the specific pattern of which components are affected remains unclear. This study examined EF performance in Spanish-speaking children with DLD compared to typically developing (TD) pee...

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Published in:Journal of Speech, Language & Hearing Research Vol. 68; no. 12; pp. 5921 - 5938
Main Authors: Torres-Morales, Felipe, Morgan, Gary, Reyes, María Antonia, Vega, Marcela, Rosas, Ricardo
Format: Article
Published: American Speech-Language-Hearing Association Dec2025
Subjects:
Online Access:View this record in EBSCOhost
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      dt: Dec2025
      vid: 68
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      pub: American Speech-Language-Hearing Association
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        10.1044/2025_JSLHR-24-00344
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        atl: Executive Function Performance in Spanish-Speaking Children With Developmental Language Disorder: Uniformity and Variability.
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        au:
          Torres-Morales, Felipe
          Morgan, Gary
          Reyes, María Antonia
          Vega, Marcela
          Rosas, Ricardo
        affil:
          Departamento de Fonoaudiología, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad de Chile, Santiago
          Hospital Clínico Universidad de Chile, Santiago
          Escuela de Psicología, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago
          Department of Psychology and Education Sciences, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain
          Centro de Justicia Educacional, Facultad de Educación, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago
      su:
        Chile
        Cross-sectional method
        Psychology of children with disabilities
        Task performance
        Executive function
        Socioeconomic factors
        Developmental disabilities
        Attention
        Language disorders
        Memory
        Children
        Auditory perception testing
        Cognitive testing
        T-test (Statistics)
        Research funding
        Analysis of covariance
        Spanish language
        Neuropsychological tests
        Comparative studies
      sug:
        subj:
          Cross-sectional method
          Psychology of children with disabilities
          Task performance
          Executive function
          Socioeconomic factors
          Developmental disabilities
          Attention
          Language disorders
          Memory
          Children
          Chile
          Auditory perception testing
          Cognitive testing
          T-test (Statistics)
          Research funding
          Analysis of covariance
          Spanish language
          Neuropsychological tests
          Comparative studies
      ab: Purpose: Developmental language disorder (DLD) is often associated with deficits in executive functions (EFs), but the specific pattern of which components are affected remains unclear. This study examined EF performance in Spanish-speaking children with DLD compared to typically developing (TD) peers matched for age and socioeconomic status. Method: The EFs, interference control, response inhibition, verbal and nonverbal working memory, and cognitive flexibility were assessed in 171 children between 6 and 8 years old: 72 with DLD and 99 who are TD. Group differences in EF performance were assessed after controlling for age and nonverbal reasoning. Results: Children with DLD had significantly lower performance in interference control, response inhibition, and verbal working memory compared to TD children. Nonverbal working memory and cognitive flexibility did not differ significantly between the groups. Interference control was the most affected EF in the DLD group, followed by verbal working memory and then respons e inhibition. In addition, a proportion of the DLD group had no difficulties when exploring each EF. Conclusion: Spanish-speaking children with DLD have a range of difficulties with EFs, with significant individual variability. Supplemental Material: https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.30410572
      pubtype: Academic Journal
      doctype: Article
      src: R
    language: English
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