Linguistic processing and performance in articulation-disordered subgroups of language-impaired children

The linguistic and dichotic listening performances of three groups of nine children were studied. The groups were divided as follows: (1) Language-disordered children whose articulatory errors were primarily omissions; (2) language-disordered children whose articulatory errors were primarily substitutions; (3) communicatively normal children. All subjects participated in articulation testing, imitative language tests, analysis of a spontaneous language sample, and a dichotic word task. The articulatory omission group differed significantly from the substitution group on the imitative language test but not on the developmental sentence analysis. All groups demonstrated a right ear advantage, suggesting left hemispheric processing of the dichotic stimuli. The results of the present study and prior research are discussed in terms of possible sources of variability.