Specific Language Impairment (SLI) revisited : evidence from a psycholinguistic investigation of grammatical gender abilities in Brazilian Portuguese-speaking children
This thesis is about Specific Language Impairment (SLI) in children. Its aim is twofold: 1. To provide a theoretical analysis of the field of SLI and discuss its controversies from a novel angle and 2. to present the outcome of a behavioural study which evaluated abilities related to gender agreement in Brazilian Portuguese-speaking children with language impairment. In the first part, I develop a critique of the field, focusing on the multiplicity of conceptions of the term language embraced by different disciplines that study the disorder. A critical review of how the field of SLI has developed in recent decades reveals that the conceptual fluctuation in the use of the term language has, in many ways, impeded progress in the field. I claim that the only way SLI could be a valid category is if studies focus on basic language skills which, under typical conditions, are acquired spontaneously, without any formal instruction. In Part II, I report an experimental study carried out on the basis of the approach to SLI advocated in Part I. I present a series of experiments that explore the processing of grammatical gender agreement in the Determiner Phrase (DP), in a range of lexical, morphophonological and morphosyntactic
Silveira, M.
Specific Language Impairment (SLI) revisited : evidence from a psycholinguistic investigation of grammatical gender abilities in Brazilian Portuguese-speaking children. This thesis is about Specific Language Impairment (SLI) in children. Its aim is twofold: 1. To provide a theoretical analysis of the field of SLI and discuss its controversies from a novel angle and 2. to present the outcome of a behavioural study which evaluated abilities related to gender agreement in Brazilian Portuguese-speaking children with language impairment. In the first part, I develop a critique of the field, focusing on the multiplicity of conceptions of the term language embraced by different disciplines that study the disorder. A critical review of how the field of SLI has developed in recent decades reveals that the conceptual fluctuation in the use of the term language has, in many ways, impeded progress in the field. I claim that the only way SLI could be a valid category is if studies focus on basic language skills which, under typical conditions, are acquired spontaneously, without any formal instruction. In Part II, I report an experimental study carried out on the basis of the approach to SLI advocated in Part I. I present a series of experiments that explore the processing of grammatical gender agreement in the Determiner Phrase (DP), in a range of lexical, morphophonological and morphosyntactic
specific language impairment revisit evidence psycholinguistic investigation grammatical_gender ability brazilian portuguese speaking_child specific language impairment child aim twofold provide theoretical analysis field discus controversy novel angle present outcome behavioural study evaluate ability relate gender agreement brazilian portuguese speaking_child language impairment first_part develop critique field focus multiplicity conception term language embrace different discipline study disorder critical_review field develop reveals conceptual fluctuation use term language many_way impede progress field claim way could valid category study_focus basic language_skill typical condition acquire without formal instruction part report experimental_study carry basis advocate part present_series explore processing grammatical_gender agreement determiner_phrase range lexical morphophonological morphosyntactic