Narrative Discourse in Children with Early Focal Brain Injury

doi:10.1006/brln.1997.1882

Brain and Language

Volume 61, Issue 3, 15 February 1998, Pages 335-375

https://doi.org/10.1006/brln.1997.1882 Get rights and content

Abstract

Children with early brain damage, unlike adult stroke victims, often go on to develop nearly normal language. However, the route and extent of their linguistic development are still unclear, as is the relationship between lesion site and patterns of delay and recovery. Here we address these questions by examining narratives from children with early brain damage. Thirty children (ages 3;7–10;10) with pre- or perinatal unilateral focal brain damage and their matched controls participated in a storytelling task. Analyses focused on linguistic proficiency and narrative competence. Overall, children with brain damage scored significantly lower than their age-matched controls on both linguistic (morphological and syntactic) indices and those targeting broader narrative qualities. Rather than indicating that children with brain damage fully catch up, these data suggest that deficits in linguistic abilities reassert themselves as children face new linguistic challenges. Interestingly, after age 5, site of lesion does not appear to be a significant factor and the delays we have witnessed do not map onto the lesion profiles observed in adults with analogous brain injuries.

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The research reported here has been supported by NINDS-NIH Grant P250-NS-22343 and NIDCD Grant R29 DC00539. We also thank Judi Fenson, Gretchen Chapman, and Shelley Flores for their help in data collection and transcription as well as the families who have graciously participated in this study.

Address correspondence and reprint requests to Judy Snitzer Reilly, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA 92182.

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Regular ArticleNarrative Discourse in Children with Early Focal Brain Injury☆,☆☆

Abstract

Cortex

Brain and Language

Brain and Cognition

Neuropsychologia

Brain and Language

Brain and Language

Brain and Language

Brain and Language

Brain and Language

Brain and Language

Brain and Language

Brain and Language

Brain and Language

Developmental Brain Research

Brain and Language

Brain and Language

Brain Research Review

Brain and Language

Brain and Language

Neuropsychologia

Brain and Cognition

Current Opinion in Neurobiology

Neuropsychologia

Neuropsychologia

Neuropsychologia

Cognitive Psychology

Brain and Language

Acquired aphasia in children

Brain

Early brain damage

The child's concept of story

Language sequelae of unilateral brain lesions in children

Language, communication and the brain

Verbal and cognitive sequelae following unilateral lesions acquired in early childhood

Journal of Clinical & Experimental Neuropsychology

Reading among children with left- and right-brain lesions

Developmental Neuropsychology

The acquisition of narratives

Narrative development: Six approaches

On the ability to provide evaluative comments: Further explorations of children's narrative competencies

Journal of Child Language

What holds a narrative together? The linguistic encoding of episode boundaries

Papers in Pragmatics

Emotion, narrative and affect

Developmental and stylistic variation in the composition of early vocabulary

Journal of Child Language

On the ability to relate events in narrative

Discourse Processes

Relating events in a narrative

Plasticity and specificity of language localization in the developing brain

Developmental Medicine and Child Neurology

Channels of emotional expression in patients with unilateral brain damage

Archives of Neurology

Emotional and non-emotional facial behaviour in patients with unilateral brain damage

Journal of Neurology, Neuro-surgery, and Psychiatry

Interhemispheric and intrahemispheric control of emotion: A focus on unilateral brain damage

Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology

The nature of hemispheric specialization in man

Behavioral and Brain Sciences

Regular Article
Narrative Discourse in Children with Early Focal Brain Injury☆,☆☆