Language Development in the Second Year of Life: The Case of Children with Sex Chromosome Trisomies Diagnosed before Birth

Abstract

Many individual factors, such as early communicative skills, could play a role in explaining later linguistic outcomes. The detection of predictive variables is fundamental to identifying early the children who need intervention. The present study focuses on children with sex chromosome trisomies (SCTs), genetic conditions with an increased risk of developing language delays or impairments. The aims are to analyse their communicative skills at 18 months of age, and identify significant predictors of their later vocabulary size. Participants were 76 18-month-old children (38 with SCTs, and 38 typically-developing (TD) children). Their communicative skills were assessed during a parent–child play session, and parents filled in a report on their vocabulary development at 18 and 24 months. Children with SCTs showed significantly poorer linguistic skills at 18 months in both preverbal (babbling and gestures) and verbal abilities. A high percentage (nearly 70%) of toddlers with SCTs were late-talking children at 24 months, and those toddlers showed a lower frequency of babbling utterances at 18 months. Early lexical skills, children’s developmental quotient, and being part of the group of toddlers with SCTs were significant predictors of children’s vocabulary size six months later. These variables should be considered when assessing the linguistic competence of a child with SCTs to detect possible early risk factors of future language impairment.

Maternal input to 24‐month‐old children with sex chromosome trisomies

“…Finally, we must note that in our sample, the WLA children group comprises 21 children with SCTs (about 91% of the total) and only two TD children (about 9%). This data confirmed the higher incidence of language delays in children with SCTs than in the general population, as previously found in the literature (see, e.g., Urbanus et al, 2022;Zampini et al, 2022).…”

“…The developmental quotient was assessed by the administration of the Griffiths Mental Developmental Scales (GMDS, Griffiths & Huntley, 2007). As previously found (Legget et al., 2010; Zampini et al., 2022), we found a significant difference in the developmental quotient scored by children with SCTs and TD children (U = 120.00; p = 0.001). Specifically, children with SCTs showed an average developmental quotient 10 points lower than that of TD children.…”

“…Some populations, such as preterm‐born children (e.g., Sansavini et al., 2011) or children with sex chromosome trisomies (SCTs; e.g., Zampini et al., 2022), are usually characterised by a higher prevalence of LT children than the normative population. The present study focussed on children with SCTs and the input addressed to them by their mothers.…”

“…Considering language development in children with SCTs, language delays were found as early as 8 months in the production of babbling utterances (Zampini et al., 2021). Moreover, speech sound and vocabulary development delays were found at 18 and 24 months (Capelli et al., 2023; Zampini et al., 2018, 2022). In particular, nearly 70% of children with SCTs in Zampini et al.’s study (2022) were identified as LT children at 24 months.…”

“…Moreover, speech sound and vocabulary development delays were found at 18 and 24 months (Capelli et al., 2023; Zampini et al., 2018, 2022). In particular, nearly 70% of children with SCTs in Zampini et al.’s study (2022) were identified as LT children at 24 months. Language problems also remain relevant later during development, resulting in a higher frequency of learning impairments in children with SCTs than in TD children (Bishop et al., 2011).…”