title: A longitudinal study of narrative development in children and adolescents with Down syndrome.
abstract: The present study examined narrative development in children and adolescents with Down syndrome longitudinally. Narratives were collected from 32 children and adolescents with Down syndrome three times over a 1-year period. Both micro- and macrolevel analyses were conducted. Significant growth over the 1-year period was seen in semantic complexity and narrative structure. However, there was no evidence of growth in syntactic complexity or narrative length. Mental age and comprehension skills at Time 1 predicted scores in all 4 areas at Time 3. Expressive language skills added further to the prediction of syntactic complexity and story length.
authors.affiliation: School of Human Communication Disorders, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. pcleave@dal.ca
authors.forename: Patricia
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Cleave
authors.forename: Elizabeth Kay-Raining
authors.initials: EK
authors.lastname: Bird
authors.forename: Rachael
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Czutrin
authors.forename: Lindsey
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Smith
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D004314:Down Syndrome / Q000523:psychology*; D006801:Humans; D007804:Language Development; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D033262:Narration