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Sentence Comprehension Deficits of Specific Language Impairment (Montgomery et al., 2016)
journal contribution
posted on 2022-02-23, 18:22 authored by James W. Montgomery, Ronald B. Gillam, Julia L. EvansPurpose: Compared with same-age typically developing
peers, school-age children with specific language
impairment (SLI) exhibit significant deficits in spoken
sentence comprehension. They also demonstrate a
range of memory limitations. Whether these 2 deficit
areas are related is unclear. The present review article
aims to (a) review 2 main theoretical accounts of
SLI sentence comprehension and various studies
supporting each and (b) offer a new, broader, more
integrated memory-based framework to guide future
SLI research, as we believe the available evidence favors
a memory-based perspective of SLI comprehension
limitations.
Method: We reviewed the literature on the sentence
comprehension abilities of English-speaking children with
SLI from 2 theoretical perspectives.
Results: The sentence comprehension limitations of children
with SLI appear to be more fully captured by a memory-based
perspective than by a syntax-specific deficit perspective.
Conclusions: Although a memory-based view appears to be
the better account of SLI sentence comprehension deficits,
this view requires refinement and expansion. Current memory-based perspectives of adult sentence comprehension, with
proper modification, offer SLI investigators new, more integrated
memory frameworks within which to study and better understand
the sentence comprehension abilities of children with SLI.
