Better Understanding of (Developmental) Language Disorders in Children

Dear Colleagues,

Developmental language disorder (DLD) is a frequently occurring condition, identified by a child's serious and persistent difficulty in acquiring and using language in the absence of manifest causes. Next to DLD, disorders of language can also be associated with unfavorable prenatal or perinatal factors, specific neurodevelopmental disorders, including ASD and ADHD, as well as syndromes resulting from genetic abnormalities, such as copy number variants. The linguistic as well as cognitive profiles of children with DLD have been extensively documented, and this can be said about ASD and ADHD too. The picture is less clear for language disorders associated with genetic syndromes (with the possible exception of Down’s and Williams’) or pre- and perinatal problems.

Systematic and detailed descriptions of the developmental language profiles associated with each of these conditions, and systematic comparisons of the various phenotypes with one another, as well as with DLD, are likely to yield insights that are relevant both theoretically and clinically. For example, it has been firmly established that grammar (morphosyntax) is a specific area of vulnerability in DLD. The (fairly scarce) studies on language development in children with various genetic syndromes suggest that their grammatical profiles are aberrant as well. An important question concerns the extent to which these profiles are qualitatively similar. If so, we need to explain why it is that such a specific phenotypical feature is associated with disparate pathological pathways. This will deepen our insight into the neurobiological and neurocognitive underpinnings of language development and developmental language disorders. There is clinical relevance as well: a child that presents with a DLD-like profile may actually suffer from a hitherto undiagnosed condition, and it remains to be seen if an intervention that is effective for DLD can be successful in such a case.

We seek to address these and related questions in the present special issue of Behavioral Science. To this end, we solicit original research papers and (systematic) reviews (or meta-analyses) that contribute to the following:

• (Linguistically informed) descriptions of language disorders in children that are linked to other pathological profiles;
• Comparative analyses of language profiles of children that suffer from, or have been subjected to, conditions that affect their development;
• Insights into neurobiological or neurocognitive factors involved in DLD and/or language disorders associated with specific pathologies.

Prof. Dr. Frank Wijnen
Dr. Tessel Boerma
Guest Editors

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• developmental language disorder
• language disorder associated with X
• genetic syndromes
• pre- and perinatal problems
• underpinnings of (impaired) language development
• neurocognition
• neurobiology