Language delay in children from 24 to 36 months of age: diagnostic criteria and guidelines for the clinician

In the current report, we present data concerning a follow-up up study of 23 toddlers diagnosed as language delayed (late talkers) at a mean age of 28 months. The results show. that 56.5% of the late talkers failed to catch rip to their peers in expressive language by age 3. As for predictors, delay or deficit in receptive grammar at an early age was able to discriminate the truly delayed children (SLI) from the so-called "late bloomers" (transiently delayed). At a later point, while group differences in language comprehension missed most of tbheir significance measures of language production clearly identified children with goon outcome. The above results suggest that health practitioners need to be aware that a 24-30 month-old child with little or no expressive speech and poor grammatical receptive abilities may be at significant risk for continuing language problems, thus requiring referral to the professional services for enrollment in educational programs for preeschoolers with SLI.