language development

The stages of language acquisition in bilingual children are similar to those in their monolingual peers. At the same period of time, they produce the first words, memorize about 50 words, and begin to make sentences by combining words which they know. The process of language acquisition in simultaneous bilingual children is the same as that of monolinguals. A 5-month-old bilingual child is aware that s/he hears two languages, though the sounds of the two languages are very similar (Macrory, 2006, p. 164; Gauthier, 2012, p. 8).Due to the ongoing increase in the number of bilingual people as the result of some events such as migration, and considering the contradictory results of the studies concerning the effect of bilingualism on language development, the present study aims to compare the morpho-syntactic development of normal Persian and Persian-Turkish speaking children at three age groups of 37-46, 47-56 and 57-66 months old using Persian Developmental Sentence Scoring (PDSS) (Jalilehvand et al., 2016). It is expected that the morpho-syntactic development of the subjects will be the same in both language groups, with no statistically significant difference. The result of this study can provide evidence in support or rejecting the results of those studies (e.g., Bialystok et al., 2008; Blom, 2010; Dahlgren et al., 2017) indicating the superiority of the monolinguals’ verbal performance over their bilingual peers’.

The main purpose of this causal-comparative research was to compare language development & social communication in 4-6 year old boys and girls in kindergartens in Qom province..

The current research was applied in terms of purpose and experimental analytical research in terms of method.The statistical population of this causal-comparative study included all 4-6-year-old boys and girls in kindergartens in Qom province. To select the sample, a multi-stage cluster sampling method was used as follows. Two districts were randomly selected from the four educational districts of Qom province, and 10 kindergartens were selected from among the kindergartens in these districts. 30 people from each kindergarten were tested. The criteria for entering the research were: children present in the kindergarten educational program, who do not have behavioral, mental, and speech problems, and the language used in the child's speech must be Farsi, although the child may also be fluent in another language. In addition, the parents of the children as well as the child himself should have the consent to take the tests. The criteria for leaving the research were: parents' dissatisfaction (The children of the sample group were evaluated using the Told-p.3 language development test by taking a test from the child, and the social communication subscale of the Nyusha cognitive development test, social communication and movement in Farsi-speaking children, by asking the children's mothers. The data obtained from completing the questionnaires were analyzed after collection using SPSS software package version 25. The mean test of independent groups with t index and one-way analysis of variance were used to analyze the data.

The average values of two groups in language development indicated that in the main sub-test: related vocabulary, the average scores of boys are higher than girls. However, in the main sub-test: comprehension of grammar, the average scores of girls are higher than boys. And the difference between the mean scores of boys & girls aged 4 to 6 years is not significant in the variable of social communication.

In explaining the results in language development, the observed difference can be attributed to gender differences in brain structures and the fit and compatibility of the environment with the differences between the two sexes. Regarding the lack of influence of gender in the evolution of social communication, various variables such as social changes, cultural contexts and the creation of equal educational opportunities, the effectiveness of social learning and communication with peers, have been influential in this result.

The study of healthy children's performance and exploration of the developmental process concerning language categories and levels can establish a suitable foundation for creating developmental tests to assess language proficiency in healthy children. Connected speech, in the form of a description or verbal report of the related events, refers to a multidimensional skill exhibiting the linguistic and cognitive knowledge level. The individual’s connected speech sampling is employed to assess the developmental indicators of speech quality for each age group.

The present research aimed to investigate the speech development process of healthy Persian-speaking children, 2215 utterances of 5-7-year-old healthy Persian-speaking children from 200 descriptive speech samples were analyzed according to a list of speech quality indicators, out of which 100 speech samples belonged to boys and 100 speech samples to girls. On the other hand, 100 speech samples were produced by 5-6-year-old children and 100 speech samples by 6-7-year-old children. The whole utterances included 17427 words.

The research results revealed a significant difference between the two groups in terms of speech analysis indicators of “number of utterances”, “number of grammatical words”, “number of nouns”, “number of verbs”, “number of pronouns”, and “number of conjunctions”, which are all structural indicators, i.e.

In the development process from the 5-6-year-old children group to the 6-7-year-old ones, these indicators have more significant development and may be used in assessing development processes.

Mean length of utterance (MLU) is a measure of systematic assessing and describing of language development in children. This study aims to compare language development in Persian and Persian-Turkish Preschoolers by this syntactic measure in a descriptive-analytical method. To do so, 30 Persian and 30 Persian-Turkish preschoolers were selected from 3 age groups of 37-46, 47-56, and 57-66 months. After collecting language samples, data analysis was done by SPSS statistical software. Results show the high correlation between MLUm and MLUw. This supports Parker’s (2005) finding indicating that MLUm and MLUw can be effectively and interchangeably used to measure language development in children. On the other hand, there’s a significant difference between Persian and Persian-Turkish Preschoolers language development only at the age of 57-66 months, this is in line with the findings of some research such as Dahlgren et al. (2017) indicating the verbal performance superiority of monolingual children over their bilingual peers. The verbal performance of two language groups is the same at the earlier ages and they show similar language development with their age increasing.

 The study of language development and metalinguistic awareness of children is one of the main topics in learning disorders. Some believe that linguistic ability and metalinguistic awareness play an important role in the ability of children with dyslexia to read; Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the linguistic and meta linguistic skills of children with dyslexia and normal children. For this study, 16 dyslexic students and 32 children of the same age were selected and after performing linguistic and metalinguistic development tests, the results were analyzed by SPSS software.According to the results of the present study, there is a significant difference between the normal and dyslexic groups in most subtests of language development and phonological awareness tests. Unlike grammatical judgment and lexical awareness subtests, the difference between the two groups is quite significant in the verb tense subtest. In both groups, there is a correlation between some subtests of meta linguistic with some subtests of language development.Therefore, these findings confirm the hypothesis of interaction between metalinguistic and linguistic development and show that dyslexic children, unlike lexical awareness tasks, have problems in most linguistic and metalinguistic, so it is necessary these skills will be Strengthen.

The present study examines the lexical and syntactic development of dissimilar Persian-speaking twins named Behzad and Behnam over a period of ten months (from the beginning of 21 months to the beginning of 31 months). This study seeks to find out what differences and similarities there are in the syntactic and lexical development of these twins, despite the fact that the two children grow up in the same language environment. The data of this study were collected through rapid observation and recording of data in a notebook, audio and video recording using a video camera and audio recorder, as well as the diary of the mother of the twins in which children's language products were recorded. The investigation of the collected data and their comparative analysis each month shows a significant difference between the lexical and syntactic development of the twins. Although in the early months of the study, Behzad had a much higher language ability compared to his twin brother, Behnam, from the fourth month of the study, a significant increase in Behnam's lexical and syntactic growth rate was observed. Considering that the language development environment of these two children, both in the family and in the kindergarten, has often been the same, the existence of differences in the lexical and syntactic developmental stages of these two children can be attributed to the difference in innate and inherited linguistic talent of these two children. Dizygotic twins do not have exactly the same chromosomal structure. The results of this study show creative mental activities in two children, which is evidenced by the existence of numerous cases of over-extension and overgeneralization.

The issue with bilingualism is the level of fluency and fluency of bilingual speakers in the non-dominant language. The present study aimed to investigate the effect of bilingualism on the language development of Kurdish (Kalhori dialect) and Persian bilingual students in the first to third grades of elementary school. Given the importance of language development and the phenomenon of bilingualism, research on the factors affecting language development, especially in bilingual children, can help us understand the nature of language, how it is learned, the learning process and its function. On the other hand, due to the multilingual nature of Iran and the fact that most people in different cities speak two or more languages, the importance of the research topic is doubled. In this regard, in the city of Kermanshah, most people are able to speak both Kalhori Kurdish and Persian. Some children in this area learn both Kurdish and Persian at an early age, and others learn Persian from the educational environment after entering school. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of bilingualism on the language development of Kurdish and Persian language students in the first to third grades of elementary school. Few studies have been conducted on the effect of bilingualism on language development, each of which shows different perspectives. Researchers have reached conflicting conclusions about the effect of bilingualism on children's cognitive development and academic achievement. Some studies suggest that learning a second or more languages ​​at the same time may be accompanied by a delay in one language for some time. However, other research has shown that these results are temporary and that bilinguals eventually learn both languages.

Nahj al-Balagha, the Imam Ali's Speeches collected by Seyyed Razhi (the famous Imamie Scholor in the fourth century) is said to be over the Creature speech and below the the creator speech. It is a precious book containing the sermons; letters and short words (Hekmat) of Ali (as). This book is important both literally, religiously, politically and socially. It has been available to Muslims for centuries and they benefited greatly from it. This book has several translations in Persian that number up to 100 titles But in addition to the valuable and useful points in these translations, there are some ambiguities that damages the proper understanding of Nahj al-Balagha's terms, so that in some cases the meaning of Mulla 'Ali's words is inconsistent with these translations. Sometimes the translation of the literal meaning of the phrase is rendered by an interpreter, and sometimes the changes of literal meaning of the words over the centuries has been ignored. The categorization of these ambiguities and mistakes and recognizing their damages to the correct meaning of Nahj al-Balagha's in its translations are the subject of this article.

Oral communication has been one of the most fundamental types of human communication and the urgent need throughout history and around the world. Human beings are naturally social beings, hence, the necessity of using cooperative patterns and developing oral communication rather than individual is felt more than before. In this regard, the present study was conducted to examine cooperative learning and language development in individuals from the perspective of language sociology. The data were collected using a mixed method of research with test, questionnaire and interview tools. 52 learners in two 26-person control and experimental groups, one instructor as a psychological counselor along with two English teachers participated in the study. The control group was taught on the basis of traditional model while the experimental group was group teaching. Statistically, there was a significant difference between two groups after the implementation of the research process. There was strong evidence for a relationship between the teamwork pattern, learners’ participation, and intrinsic motivation.

Early intervention is important to minimize persistent difficulties in language and its related domains in  preschool children with or at-risk of language impairment. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of shared story reading program on the development of language skills of preschool children of low socioeconomic status. This study adopted a quasi- experimental research design with pretest-posttest-follow-up and a control group. From two preschool centers in Ahmadabad Mostofi town during a multi-level screening process, 30 children whose language test scores were below the standard deviation (70-85) were selected, being diagnosed for language problems. They were randomly assigned to the experimental and control groups. Subjects in the experimental group (n=15) were further divided into four smaller groups, received 30 shared story reading program intervention sessions, each session lasting 45 minutes three days a week. Data were collected through Test of Language Development and Narrative. Data analysis was performed by using the Repeated Measures MANOVA. The results indicated a significant effect (P=0/001) of the program on increase of semantic knowledge, syntactic knowledge, and language development in general, and improvement of narrative writing in the experimental group. Post-test and follow-up differential scores also approved the effectiveness of the shared story reading program. Accordingly, the shared story reading program is recommended as a preventive program, potentially bridging the word gap for at-risk children.

Cerebral Palsy (CP) is a movement disorder caused by a non-progressive brain lesion and its symptoms appear in the form of developmental damages. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the Quantitative Electroencephalography (qEEG) signals upon carrying out a speech and language task and to compare the components of language function and common spatial patterns extracted from children with cerebral palsy and healthy ones. In this study, 17 children with CP and 40 healthy children aged from 7 to 12 were studied. In order to evaluate the phonetic, phonological, syntactic, and semantic features of the language in the CP group in comparison to healthy control participants, a Test of Language Development (TOLD) was employed. To examine their electrophysiological signals on the basis of amplitude and frequency of brain waves, as well as brain connectivity across spectral bands, the 16-channel quantitative electroencephalography was used. In addition, the qualitative evaluation and output of the language development test were reported to determine the areas in need of improvement in both healthy and cerebral palsy groups. The results of this study showed that children with cerebral palsy had significant problems in the sub-scales of the language development test as compared to healthy children. It was also observed that children with cerebral palsy scored the lowest score in the grammatical completion subtest. The qEEG-based brain mapping revealed a significant difference in the amplitude of waves and brain connectivity in the area needing improvement between the two groups.

Regarding the impact of hearing loss on language development and metalinguistic skill and being language development different from metalinguistic skill in bilingual children, studying of these skills in different bilingual children and comparing them with normal bilingual children can help us understand more about language development in children and the factors involved in it. The present study aims at Investigating and Comparing linguistic and metalinguistic skills of bilingual (Turkish-Persian) children with cochlear implant and their normal hearing peers.

The present follow-up study was conducted on six children with cochlear implant and six normal hearing peers that was randomly selected from preschool students of Zanjan city in the school year of 97-98. We compared these children in Mean Length of Utterance, lexical richness, lexical awareness and syntactic awareness. To investigate language development, continuous speech, and to investigate metalinguistic awareness, lexical awareness (including content and structural analysis of word definition) and syntactic awareness tests was used.

Data analysis revealed that developing language and metalinguistic skills in bilingual preschool children with hearing loss in Turkish-Persian were delayed. (P <0.05). But in Persian language, of the indices of language growth, only the Mean Length of utterance (mean number of morphemes per word) is delayed (P <0.05). There was no significant difference in any of the content and structural aspects of word definition in hearing loss children (P>0.05).  The low ability level of subjects’ in metalinguistic skills in Turkish language can be ascribed to the formal teaching of Persian in schools. In addition, Spearman's correlation coefficient indicated that there is a positive and significant correlation between indices of language growth, lexical awareness of bilingual (Turkish-Persian) children with hearing loss and normal hearing peers in both Persian and Turkish.

The purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of  shared story reading education program on language development and reading readiness of preschool children with language impairment. In this semi-experimental study with pretest-posttest, and control group design, 30 preschool girls in experimental and control groups responded to Reading Readiness Test and Test of Language Development and Test of Phonological Awareness. The experimental group received 30 shared story reading treatment program sessions, with each session lasting 45 minutes three times a week. The results of statistical procedures of univariate and multivariate covariance analysis indicated that shared story reading program was effective in increasing reading readiness and phonological awareness and language skills in preschool children with language impairment. In sum, these findings suggest that shared story reading program by increasing positive expressive, semantic and syntactic skills as well as the development of paralanguage skills and pre-reading could result in readiness of the child to read before entering school.

Sequential learning is an inseparable part of language development. Children who have difficulty to perform sequential motor tasks are poorer in the language skills as well. Therefore, the present study aimed to investigate the effect of sequential motor training on language development of children with the cochlear implant.

This study was quasi-experimental kind with pretest-posttest design, in which 22 children (9 girls and 13 boys) aged 4 to 8 years who were randomly selected and assigned into two groups of experimental and control. The experimental group underwent a twelve-week sequential motor training of taekwondo. Phonological awareness, reading and dyslexia tests (NEMA) were used to collect data on phonological awareness and reading performance, respectively. The data were analyzed using analysis of covariance.

The results showed that, after the twelve weeks of taekwondo training, the experimental group significantly outperformed the control group in phonological awareness and reading performance.

According to the obtained results, there seems to be a strong relationship between language and motor systems, and sequential motor training, in the case of taekwondo training, which can be an effective exercise method to improve language skills of children with the cochlear implant

Permanent childhood hearing impairment often results in speech and language problems that are already apparent in early childhood. Past studies show a clear link between language skills and the child’s social functioning. The aim of this study was to examine the effect of the level of language development on social functions in children with hearing impairment.
Test of Language Development(TOLD-3) and Matson Evaluation of Social Skills with Youngsters(MESSY) were used for evaluating language development and social behaviors of 120 children with hearing impairment in Shiraz, Iran. Structural equation model was used to analyze the data in Amos Graphic-18.
level of language development had direct significant effect on social behaviors and 35 percent variance in social behaviors was predicted by language development.
language development is the important factor in social functions in children with hearing impairment.

Language acquisition is a natural developmental process and is unique to Homo sapiens in which a child acquiring his or her mother tongue as a first language.  The simplest theory of language development is that children learn language by imitating adult language. A second possibility is that children acquire language through conditioning. Noam Chomsky put forward innateness hypothesis. Piaget argued that language is a cognitive process and that linguistic development depends on general cognitive development. Lev Vygotsky proposed that although children have innate cognitive bases for language acquisition, the actual learning begins with functions that children want to express. Finally, the connectionist theory of language development suggested that children acquire language without ever figuring out the rules or even that there are rules. Although a great deal of research has been conducted, it still is not known exactly how children are able to succeed in the remarkable feat of language acquisition. Some attempts to relate cognitive and linguistic development using the Piagetian stages have not been successful. Major advances have occurred in understanding both linguistic and cognitive development, but these advances have not been shown to have a close relationship. It is not possible with the present state of knowledge to choose definitively from the different theories. It seems logical that a combination of imitative skills, an innate language acquisition device, cognitive development, and social communication interactions contribute to language development.

The purpose of recent study was construction, investigating validity and reliability of the Language Development Scale of Children. Research method was descriptive, test making type. In first step, the Language Development Scale of Children was designed based on the theoretical and experimental foundations and developmental competences of children. 52 children (girls & boys) were selected by multi-stage cluster sampling method from Isfahan's nurseries, preschool centers and primary schools of 6 educational districts, then it was performed on them and the psychometric properties were measured. In second step 200 children were selected in the way of Cochran from these centers. To study reliability and validity of instrument the sample group completed the Language Development Scale of Children and Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scale. To investigating the reliability, Cronbach Alpha and for validity of instrument validity exploratory factor analysis method and criterion validity were used. Results showed the total internal consistency of the Language Development Scale of Children was 0. 98 and subscales internal consistency was 0. 96. The results of exploratory factor analysis method showed two factors model of the Language Development Scale of Children including, Receptive language subscale and Expressive language subscale. These two factors explained 54. 91 variance of the total scale. Also the correlation coefficient between the Language Development Scale of Children and Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scale was 0. 91, which indicated satisfactory criterion validity for the Language Development Scale of Children. Confirmatory the Language Development Scale of Isfahan's Children has appropriate reliability and validity for evaluating development of receptive and expressive language in children under 8 years old.

The aim of this study conducted to examine mediator role of private speech in conceptual model relation between language development and secure attachment with self-regulation in children. Using available sampling method, 128 children from kindergarten centers of Tehran city were selected. Persian Version of Test of language development (Newcomer and Hammill, 1997), Disturbances of Attachment Interview (Smyke & Zeanah, 1999), self-regulation scale (Amrai, 2015), Preschool Children Behavioral Disorder (Shahim and Yousefi, 1999) and Structured Observation of Behavioral Regulation (Ponitz and et al, 2008) were administered with both mothers and their children. Path analysis was employed in order to analyze the data. The results showed that model have fitness in which language development and secure attachment have direct and indirect effects on behavioral self-regulation. In addition, private speech showed mediated role for relationship of language development and secure attachment as well as self-regulation. The findings of present study showed prediction of children self-regulation based on language development and secure attachment with mediator role of private speech. Therefore it is reasonable to suggest considering language development and attachment style of children as a way to reduce behavioral problem and improve self-regulation.

Theory of mind is the ability to attribute mental states—belief, intent, desire, pretending, knowledge, etc.—to oneself and others and to understand that others have mental states that are different from one's own and also reality. Regarding the considerable impairment of communication abilities in children with autism, the present study addresses the relationship between Theory of Mind and language, as well as those components of language that explain the abilities involved in ToM, in these children. The subjects comprised 110 children with autism, aged 4 to 16, who were evaluated using the Persian version of The Test of Language Development (Hassanzadeh & Minaei, 2002) and False Belief Tasks (Wimmer& Perner, 1983). The results of analysis of  data revealed significant impact of subtests of grammatical understanding, picture vocabulary and oral vocabulary on the Theory of Mind in autistic children.