GRAMMATICAL MORPHOLOGY IN SPECIFIC LANGUAGE IMPAIRMENT

许多有特殊语言障碍(SLI)的儿童在语法语素的使用方面表现出特别严重的限制。有问题的语素包括动词屈折变化，如-S(她走着去上班)，以及虚词，如助动词(如克里斯正在打电话)。这个问题可能由来已久，通常会延续到学生时代。这个项目的目的是探索这些语法语素限制的可能基础。为了实现这一目标，将采用实验性治疗范例。每一种对SLI儿童语法语素限制的不同解释都对通常研究的语法语素提供了合理的解释。然而，这些解释在更大范围的语法语素上的预测是不同的。通过监测儿童对不同语法语素集合的产生和理解，并对儿童进行集中处理，在未处理集合上看到的获得模式应该揭示语素之间关系的本质。因为没有两个账户对所有的语素都做出相同的预测，由此产生的数据模式应该会支持一些账户，并反对另一些账户。所采用的治疗设计也应提供临床性质的重要益处。大量参与SLI的儿童和需要研究的语法语素范围广泛，应提供有关治疗效果和可能从这种治疗中预期的泛化模式的重要信息。

Many children with specific language impairment (SLI) show an especially serious limitation in the use of grammatical morphemes. The problematic morphemes include verb inflections such as -s (as in "She walks to work"), and function words such as auxiliary verbs (as in "Chris is talking on the phone"). The problem can be longstanding, often carrying into the school years. The purpose of this project is to explore the possible bases of these grammatical morpheme limitations. To accomplish this goal, an experimental treatment paradigm will be employed. Each of the alternative explanations of grammatical morpheme limitations in children with SLI provides a reasonable account of the grammatical morphemes commonly studied. However, these accounts differ in their predictions across a wider range of grammatical morphemes. By monitoring the children's production and comprehension of different sets of grammatical morphemes and providing the children with intensive treatment on one set, the pattern of gains seen on the untreated sets should reveal the nature of the relationship among the morphemes. Because no two accounts make the same predictions for all morphemes, the resulting pattern of data should lend support to some accounts and argue against others. The treatment design to be employed should also provide important benefits of a clinical nature. The large number of children with SLI participating and the wide range of grammatical morphemes to be studied should provide important information about both the efficacy of treatment and the generalization patterns that might be expected from this treatment.