Fast Mapping Abilities of Late Talkers and Toddlers with Typical Language Development

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Fast Mapping Abilities of Late Talkers and
Toddlers with Typical Language Development

• Susan Ellis Weismer, PhD
• University of Wisconsin-Madison
• Funding provided by NIDCD R01 DC03731 and Waisman
  Center core grant P30 HD03352

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Background

• Interest in Late Talkers
• Examining the range of individual difference in
  language acquisition
• Risk for Specific Language Impairment (SLI)
• Focus on word learning
• Vocabulary deficits are hallmark of LTs
• Children with SLI have been shown to have
  deficits in novel word learning/fast mapping
  early indicators of problems may be predictive of
  later language outcomes

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Research Questions

• Do late talkers exhibit limitations in fast
  mapping processes compared to typically
  developing toddlers?
• How does performance on a novel word learning
  task relate to extant language abilities?
• Do early fast mapping abilities predict later
  language skills?

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Group Comparisons
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Assessment Measures at 26
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Novel Word Learning Task

• Two nonsense words - koob and tade- presented
  3 times each within puppet play activity
• Novel words (object labels) presented with 2
  familiar words
• Production and comprehension assessed after each
  exposure phase

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Video Clip of Task
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Group Differences in Novel Word Learning
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Relation between Fast Mapping Abilities and
Extant Language Skills
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Correlations at 26
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Correlations at 26

• For the Late Talkers, the strongest associations
  at 26 were between
• Novel Word Comprehension and CDI words produced,
  r.469
• Novel Word Comprehension and PLS production,
  r.419

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Analysis of Learning Patterns

• Amount of Exposure

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Analysis of Learning Patterns

• Stimulus Features of Nonwords

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• Phonotactic Probability refers to the likelihood
  of a particular sound sequence (diphone
  probabilities)
• Neighborhood Density refers to the number of
  phonologically similar neighbors, i.e. words
  differing by a single phoneme substitution,
  deletion, or addition

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Stimulus Features
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Individual Learning Patterns

• Analysis of individual learning patterns revealed
  that about 66 of NL group displayed a koob
  advantage
• 43 of the LTs (17) showed a koob advantage
• 20 of the LTs (8) showed a tade advantage
• 37 of the LTs (15) showed no preference

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MLU for koob Advantage
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Prediction of Language Outcomes
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Prediction of Comprehension at 56

• For the entire sample, performance on the novel
  word learning task (comp and prod) at 26
  significantly predicted childrens comprehension
  scores on the TOLDP at 56 (R2 .11)

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Prediction of Production at 56

• For the group as a whole, 26 performance on the
  novel word learning task (comp prod)
  significantly predicted MLU at 36 (R.335, R2
  .11) but did not predict MLU at 56
• Similarly, fast mapping abilities did not predict
  production scores on the TOLDP at 56 for the
  group as a whole

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Prediction of LTs Comprehension at 56
R2 .21
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Prediction of LTs Production at 56
R2 68
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Summary and Conclusions
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• Summary LTs demonstrated lower total
  comprehension and production accuracy scores and
  displayed less steep learning slopes across 3
  exposure trials than NL controls
• Conclusion Late talkers display limitations in
  fast mapping processes compared to typically
  developing toddlers

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• Summary Both groups comprehended koob better
  than tade and the NL group also showed a
  production advantage for koob
• Conclusions The majority of children in both
  groups appeared to demonstrate better learning of
  the low neighborhood density nonword
• The groups displayed qualitatively similar
  patterns with respect to their sensitivity to
  features of the nonwords

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• Summary Modest, significant correlations were
  found between novel word learning performance and
  scores on standard language measures
• Both groups showed similar patterns of
  correlations
• Conclusion There is a significant positive
  relation between toddlers novel word learning
  performance and their extant language skills
• Qualitatively similar patterns support notion of
  language endowment spectrum

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• Summary Novel word comprehension and production
  at 26 was a significant predictor of late
  talkers language skills at 56
• Conclusions Fast mapping performance adds to the
  prediction of late talkers language outcomes
• Linguistic processing measures (such as novel
  word learning tasks) may offer a useful adjunct
  to standardized language assessment measures

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The End