Risk for language delay in healthy preterm and full-term children: a longitudinal study from 22 to 60 months

Abstract

This study analysed the Risk for Language Delay (RLD) in a sample of healthy preterm children and a full-term control group. We collected direct and indirect measures of language development from 10 to 60 months, and we examined the influence of biomedical, cognitive and environmental variables over the RLD at 22, 30, and 60 months. While at the early ages there were not significant differences in the prevalence of RLD between preterm and full-term children, at 60 months receptive grammar delay was more frequent in the preterm group. Also, preterm children showed a higher instability in the prevalence of RLD over time. Lastly, cognitive development, maternal education and early expressive vocabulary were the most important factors to predict RLD.