Severe closed-head injury in childhood: linguistic outcomes into adulthood

The language functioning of a group of adults who had sustained a severe closed-head injury in childhood was evaluated. The subjects were administered a battery of language assessments including measures of syntax, semantics and pragmatics, as well as a measure of metalinguistic ability. Performance of the experimental group was compared with that of a control group matched for age, sex and educational level. Results indicated that all areas of language competence assessed (syntax, semantics, pragmatics) appeared to be compromised by the childhood closed-head injury.