It has been proposed that specific language impairment (SLI) is caused by an impairment of auditory processing, but it is unclear whether this problem affects temporal processing, frequency discrimination (FD), or both. Furthermore, there are few longitudinal studies in this area, making it hard to establish whether any deficit represents a developmental lag or a more permanent deficit. To address these issues, the authors retested a group of 10 children with SLI and 12 control children first tested 42 months previously. At Time 1, the children with SLI (between 9 and 12 years of age) had significantly elevated FD thresholds compared to the matched controls. At Time 2, the thresholds of both groups had improved, but the children with SLI still had poorer FD thresholds than those of the controls. To assess temporal resolution, auditory backward masking was measured and it was found that most of the children with SLI performed as well as the controls, but 2 children had exceptionally high thresholds. There was also greater variability among the children with SLI compared to that measured among the controls on the FD task. These studies indicate considerable heterogeneity in auditory function among children with SLI and suggest that, as with auditory temporal deficits, difficulties in FD discrimination are important in this population.
Speci¢c language impairment (SLI) is the term used to refer to unexplained di¤culties in language acquisition in children. Over the past decade, there has been rapid growth of evidence indicating that genes play an important part in the aetiology of SLI. However, further progress in elucidating the role of genes in causing SLI is limited by our lack of understanding of the phenotype. Studies to date have been hampered by the fact that we do not know whether SLI should be treated as a discrete disorder or a continuous variable, let alone which measures should be used to identify cases, or how many subtypes there are. Recent research suggests that theoretically motivated measures of underlying processes may be better than conventional clinical diagnoses for identifying aetiologically distinct types of language impairment. There has been a tendency for researchers to embrace parsimony and look for a single cause of SLIöor in any event, to identify di¡erent subtypes, each with a di¡erent single cause. Research is reviewed that suggests that may not be a fruitful approach to SLI, and that an approach in terms of multiple risk and protective factors, which is widely adopted in medicine, is more realistic.
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org. This content downloaded from 130.240.43.43 on Wed, 30 Dec 2015 19:36:07 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 294 294 BOOK REVIEWS BOOK REVIEWSmust ask why many educators are not using them. If our ultimate goal is to address questions and communicate findings in a way that will influence teaching practices, it is essential for researchers to spend more time observing in classrooms and talking with teachers.There is a long history of fascination with handedness both in the scientific literature and in the popular mind. Early references to handedness can be found in the Bible, the Koran, the Bhagavad Gita, the teachings of Buddha, and the Egyptiarq Book of the Dead. The problem of hand preference has caught the attention of many historical thinkers and scientists including Plato, Charles Darwin, Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Carlyle. Several early psychologists and neuropsychologists, such as J. Hughlings Jackson, G. have written on the subject. Most of these writings have included speculation about differences between left-and right-handers that transcend any simple asymmetry in motor skill between the hands, and suggest that must ask why many educators are not using them. If our ultimate goal is to address questions and communicate findings in a way that will influence teaching practices, it is essential for researchers to spend more time observing in classrooms and talking with teachers.There is a long history of fascination with handedness both in the scientific literature and in the popular mind. Early references to handedness can be found in the Bible, the Koran, the Bhagavad Gita, the teachings of Buddha, and the Egyptiarq Book of the Dead. The problem of hand preference has caught the attention of many historical thinkers and scientists including Plato, Charles Darwin, Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Carlyle. Several early psychologists and neuropsychologists, such as J. Hughlings Jackson, G. have written on the subject. Most of these writings have included speculation about differences between left-and right-handers that transcend any simple asymmetry in motor skill between the hands, and suggest that This content downloaded from 130.240.43.43 on Wed, 30 Dec 2015 19:36:07 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
The package described here enables the user to maintain a "card index system" of journal references on floppy disk, with easy retrieval of references by author, subject, or combination of subjects. Many scientists maintain a card index system of journal references. The organization of such a system can pose a problem. To file references alphabetically by author makes for easy access to a particular reference, but it is cumbersome if one wants quickly to locate all references relevant to a given topic. Filing by topic avoids this problem, but this does not work efficiently for references that are relevant to more than one topic. These problems can be overcome by using a microprocessor to store on random-access files the information that would normally be kept on index cards. The computer package described here enables the user to maintain a "card index system" on floppy disk, with easy retrieval of references by author, subject, or combination of subjects. Of course, in many respects, such programs cannot compete with the large library search systems now available in many universities. The microprocessor searches comparatively slowly, and one has available only those references that have been typed in. The program package described here would not be costeffective for someone who found typing laborious and did not have secretarial help. Two advantages of having a personalized index system based on a microcomputer are cost and availability. Perhaps the most useful aspect is the facility to develop a reference system coded to personal specifications. The subject codings used by library search systems are rational and fairly comprehensive, but they seldom correspond to the optimal partitioning of the topic for anyone specialist. Using the computer package described here, a set of references can be coded into as many subject categories as one wishes. The categories can be as broad or narrow as the user desires, and idiosyncratic categories (e.g., a classification of articles in terms of methodology, as well as subject matter) are
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