Language disorders in children with central nervous system injury

Abstract

Children with injury to the central nervous system (CNS) exhibit a variety of language disorders that have been described by members of different disciplines, in different journals, using different descriptors and taxonomies. This paper is an overview of language deficits in children with CNS injury, whether congenital or acquired after a period of normal development. It first reviews the principal CNS conditions associated with language disorders in childhood. It then describes a functional taxonomy of language, with examples of the phenomenology and neurobiology of clinical deficits in children with CNS insults. Finally, it attempts to situate language in the broader realm of cognition and in current theoretical accounts of embodied cognition.

Keywords:

• Language disorders
• Pragmatic
• Semantic
• Syntactic
• Motor speech
• Central nervous system injury

Preparation of this paper was supported in part by National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Grants P01 HD35946 and P01 HD35946–06, “Spina Bifida: Cognitive and Neurobiological Variability,” by National Institute of Neurological Diseases and Stroke Grant 2R01NS 21889–16, “Neurobehavioral Outcome of Head Injury in Children,” and by National Institutes of Health Grant 1RO1 HD04946, “Social Outcomes in Pediatric Traumatic Brain Injury.” I thank Arianna Stefanatos for assistance with manuscript preparation.