Inner Speech in children with language difficulties
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Inner speech in children with language difficulties
IRAS ID
168632
Contact name
Abigail Moran
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
City University
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 0 months, 1 days
Research summary
This project aims to look at the "inner" or "internal" speech used by children when labelling pictures in their heads. To do this, the study will look at the 'phonological similarity effect' (PSE) in children with typical development and compare them to children with language difficulties. The PSE is a very robust phenomenon in verbal short-term memory experiments whereby rhyming words are much more difficult to recall than non-rhyming words.
According to the working memory model (Baddeley, 1986), individuals can recall visual items such as nameable pictures using verbal short-term memory if they first "recode" the visual item into a name using internal speech. . Research has shown this effect develops in typically developing children at around age 6 years. In the current study, children both with and without language impairment will be shown lists of pictures with simple names visually, and then asked to point to the items in the correct order from a larger array. As this short-term picture memory task does not require any speech or verbalization it will be assumed that if the rhyming effect (PSE) is found, this is because the child has used internal speech/speech coding. . Previous research (Henry et al 2012) has suggested that children start using speech coding in STM tasks like this one at around 6 years of age. The performance of the language impaired children will be compared to the control group to identify any differences.This study will involve testing 18 6/7 year olds with language impairment as well as a control group of non-verbal IQ matched peers.
REC name
East of England - Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
15/EE/0028
Date of REC Opinion
10 Feb 2015
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion