Retrieval-Based Word Learning in Specific Language Impairment

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Children with specific language impairment (SLI) experience a significant deficit in language ability that is longstanding and harmful to the children's academic, social, and eventual economic well-being. Word learning is one of the principal weaknesses in these children. This project focuses on the word learning abilities of four- and five-year-old children with SLI in an effort to understand the nature of these difficulties. The goal of the project is to determine whether special benefits accrue when these children must frequently recall newly introduced words during the course of learning. Preliminary studies reported in this application suggest that such “repeated retrieval” activities can be applied to children of this age and might produce dramatic word learning gains. The planned studies seek to determine whether repeated retrieval produces larger gains than current procedures even in the face of less exposure to the new words, and whether the degree of effort in retrieving new words is a significant factor in the children's success. A deeper understanding of the benefits of this process will be obtained through the use of both eye gaze and neural measurements of the children's word learning, along with more conventional measures such as picture naming and picture identification. Of special interest will be whether repeated retrieval activities narrow the differences between children with SLI and their typically developing peers relative to other word learning procedures. If the planned studies reveal larger word learning gains than current methods, repeated retrieval activities can serve as the basis for the development of new methods of treatment for children with word learning difficulties.