[Narration of stories by children with specific language impairment].
BACKGROUND
narrative abilities provide rich information about the linguistic, cognitive and social competences of children with typical language development and with SLI (Specific Language Impairment). Children with SLI present deficits in speech elaboration, which is generally confusing and repetitive. Furthermore, there may be difficulty with text organization, understanding the underlying time and cause-effect relationships and in the development of the structural knowledge needed for comprehension.


OBJECTIVE
to characterize the narration of stories by children with SLI regarding the type and content of speech and to compare their performance to that of their typically developing peers, matched according to the chronological age.


METHODS
two groups participated in this study: Control Group (CG), 24 children with no language deficits and Research Group (RG), 8 children with the diagnosis of SLI. To elicit the narratives, a series of 15 stories were used, represented by illustrations containing four scenes each. These sequences were created and classified as mechanical, behavioral and intentional, according to the relationship established between the characters.


RESULTS
children with SLI presented poorer narratives when compared to their typically developing peers, independent of the type of story which was presented. Moreover, children with SLI showed a similar perception of the mental states when compared to children with normal development.


CONCLUSIONS
these results indicate that, regardless the type of story, children with SLI have difficulties in the use of language, that is, with the linguistic abilities necessary to narrate stories and not in the perception of the characters' mental state.
Befi-Lopes
Débora Maria
DM
Area de Linguagem Infantil, Departamento de Fisioterapia, Fonoaudiologia e Terapia Ocupacional, Faculdade de Medicina, Universidade de São Paulo. dmblopes@usp.br
Bento
Ana Carolina Paiva
AC
Perissinoto
Jacy
J
D016022:Case-Control Studies; D016009:Chi-Square Distribution; D002648:Child; D003071:Cognition; D032882:Comprehension; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D007805:Language Development Disorders / Q000503:physiopathology*; D008297:Male; D008606:Mental Processes / Q000502:physiology*; D033262:Narration; D010465:Perception; D013060:Speech / Q000502:physiology*; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric