Rapid Eye-Tracking Evaluation of Language in Children and Adolescents Referred for Assessment of Neurodevelopmental Disorders

ABSTRACT

Background: Language assessment is a key element of evaluations of children and adolescents with neurodevelopmental disorders (NDDs). The present study examined the validity of a gaze-based receptive language index (RLI) in predicting language test results.

Method: Participants included toddlers, pre-school, and school age children and adolescents (78.1% male; ages 1.8–17.6, M = 6.7, SD = 3.6) referred for evaluation of NDDs. A brief eye-tracking evaluation was completed that included six stimuli with 16 receptive language targets. The RLI was computed by standardising gaze metrics and averaging within and across receptive language targets.

Results: The RLI had strong validity for predicting traditional language scores (r = .48–.51) and sensitivity to language impairment (AUC = .78). Validity was maintained when controlling for potential confounding factors, including age, autism symptom severity, and eye tracking validity indicators.

Conclusions: After large sample validation and scaling for clinical use, the RLI could enhance language evaluation in individuals with NDDs, including autism and intellectual disability.

KEYWORDS:

• Children
• eye tracking
• language
• evaluation

Acknowledgment

We are grateful to the research participants in this study and thank our clinical research staff for their data collection and data reduction.

Data Availability Statement

De-identified data used for analyses in this paper are available upon request to the first author.

Disclosure statement

TWF has received federal funding or research support from, acted as a consultant to, received travel support from, and/or received a speaker's honorarium from the Cole Family Research Fund, Ohio Third Frontier Technology Validation and Startup Fund, Simons Foundation, Ingalls Foundation, Forest Laboratories, Ecoeos, IntegraGen, Kugona LLC, Shire Development, Bristol-Myers Squibb, National Institutes of Health, and the Brain and Behavior Research Foundation. EWK has received support from Kugona LLC. AYH has received research funding from Forest Pharmaceuticals and Bristol Myers Squibb and was a consultant to IntegraGen. EAY has consulted about assessment with Western Psychological Services, Janssen, Joe Startup Technologies, Lundbeck, Otsuka, and Pearson. All other authors have no financial or other conflicts of interest to disclose.

Additional information

Funding

This study was funded by a generous donation from the Stephan and Allison Cole Family Research Fund. The funders have not imposed any restrictions on free access to or publication of the research data [Grant number not applicable].