A growing body of research is challenging the notion of specific language impairment. Our investigations of language-impaired children (LI) reveal limitations in language, but neurologic abnormalities and deficits in other cognitive domains have also been noted. Further insights require study of non-verbal cognition as well as language, and the neural substrates that subserve them. Because LI can extend into adulthood, we will include adolescents with LI in our studiers. The major aims of this project are: 1. Study basic language processing abilities across a wider age range (7- 16) and examine higher order language to determine how early LI impacts on later language use and literacy. 2. Test for associations and dissociations and differentiate knowledge from processing deficits. 3. Study attention, spatial localization, laterality, visual memory and mental rotation abilities and examine for selective sparing and/or impairment across non-verbal cognitive domains. 4. Test for patterns of association and dissociation between language and cognition. 5. Conduct fMRI and ERP studies of language using paradigms tightly yoked to behavioral measures to examine language-brain mappings in LI children. 6. Conduct fMRI and ERP studies of spatial cognition and attention using paradigms tightly yoked to behavioral measures to examine for patterns of sparing and impairment in non-verbal cognition. 7. Conduct longitudinal studies of LI to examine developmental trajectories for evidence of differential catching up or continued impairment across language and cognitive domains. 8. Compare LI results to results from children with different etiologies including early focal brain injury (FL), Williams or Down Syndrome, and FL Variants (i.e. bilateral or late onset brain lesions) to further characterize the contrasting behavioral profiles noted in the last funding period and determine whether these are associated with alternative forms of brain organization.
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