Children Born Prematurely May Demonstrate Catch-Up Growth in Pre-Adolescence

Area of Science:

• Developmental Psychology
• Pediatric Neurodevelopment
• Clinical Linguistics

Background:

• Children born prematurely often exhibit lower language scores in early childhood.
• Long-term language outcomes for very preterm/very low birthweight children remain less understood.
• Attention abilities may influence language development and assessment in this population.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate language outcomes in pre-adolescent children born very preterm/very low birthweight.
• To assess language using standardized tests and productive language measures.
• To explore the moderating role of attention on language outcomes.

Main Methods:

• Longitudinal follow-up of children at 11 and 12 years of age.
• Utilized Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals-Fourth Edition subtests.
• Collected productive language measures from narrative tasks and attention ratings.

Main Results:

• Gestational age predicted standardized language scores at age 11 but not 12.
• Attention ratings moderated the relationship between gestational age and language scores.
• Gestational age did not predict productive language measures at either time point.

Conclusions:

• Pre-adolescence may be a period for language catch-up in children born prematurely.
• Multiple language assessment methods are crucial for preterm populations.
• Attention's role in language assessment outcomes warrants direct clinical consideration.