title: A clinical rationale for assessing rapid automatized naming in children with language disorders.
abstract: Three continuous rapid naming tasks (Semel, Wiig, & Secord, 1995) were administered to 2,450 American, English-speaking, academically achieving individuals with typical language development and intellectual ability (ages 6 to 21 years) and 136 individuals with primary language disorders (LD; ages 6, 7, 9, 11, 12, 15-16). Naming time in seconds differed significantly (p < .01) between the groups for color naming (Task 1) at age 12, shape naming (Task 2) at age 6, and color-shape naming (Task 3) at ages 6, 7, 9, and 12. Naming accuracy did not differ significantly (p > .01) between groups at the majority of the age levels compared. In the normative group, naming speed increased with age in a monotonic progression. The developmental trajectory in the LD group was essentially parallel, but elevated. The percentages of individuals who failed the naming-time criteria for Task 3 (color-shape naming) differed significantly in the two groups at all ages compared (p < .05). These findings indicate that the requirements for two-dimensional, continuous naming (Task 3 color-shape naming) resulted in reduced naming speed (longer total times) and interference with fluency in language production in about half of the clinical sample.
authors.affiliation: Boston University, USA.
authors.forename: E H
authors.initials: EH
authors.lastname: Wiig
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Zureich
authors.forename: H N
authors.initials: HN
authors.lastname: Chan
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001331:Automation; D002648:Child; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D003937:Diagnosis, Differential; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007804:Language Development; D007806:Language Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis*; D008297:Male; D011930:Reaction Time; D012660:Semantics; D013647:Task Performance and Analysis