Late talkers and later language outcomes: Predicting the different language trajectories.

PURPOSE: The aim of the current study was to investigate the risk factors present at 2 years for children who showed language difficulties that persisted from 2 to 10 years and difficulties that emerged later, at 10 years.

METHOD: Participants (n = 783) were drawn from the Raine Study in Western Australia. Patterns of change from 2 to 10 years were identified based on child performance on the Language Development Survey and the Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals, respectively. Logistic regression analyses were conducted to test whether parental, family and child characteristics present at 2 years predicted poorer language outcomes at age 10.

RESULT: Across the 8 year period, 5.6% of the children displayed consistently low language skills, 5.9% improved skills and 23.2% deteriorated skills. Compared to children with consistently typical skills, the deteriorated group was more likely to have mothers who smoked during pregnancy, fathers with incomplete secondary education, low family income, poor early literacy environment and be male. Children showing consistently low language skills were more likely to have mothers who smoked during pregnancy than late talkers whose early delays improved.

CONCLUSION: Results provide evidence of some modifiable risk factors at 2 years which are associated with language outcome.