IALP 2025

Complex Syntax Vocabulary: Complement-Taking Verbs and Subordinate Conjunctions in the Expressive Language of Children with Specific Language Impairment

C. Melanie Schuele
Hearing and Speech Sciences, Vanderbilt University, USA

We explored production of clausal complement verbs (CCVs) and subordinate conjunctions by 22 SLI children (MLU M = 5.24, SD = 0.99; 5-7 years) compared to 29 MLU-matched peers (MLU M = 5.21; SD = 0.84; 3-5 years) in examiner-child English language samples using a descriptive approach.

Full propositional complement clauses were produced by 26 TL children (129 tokens; mean = 5.3) and 20 SLI children (99 tokens; 4.95). The TL group had a mean of 5.00 clauses with a mean of 2.46 different CCVs. The SLI group had a mean of 5.20 clauses with a mean of 2.45 different CCVs. The TL group had a mean of 2.19 and the SLI group had a mean of 2.05 CCVs. The TL group produced 14 different CCVs, and the SLI group with 11 different CCVs. Both groups used these verbs: forget, know, say, see mean, pretend, tell, think, and wish. Unique verbs for the TL group included, ask, decide, hope, see, yell, and for the SLI group, remember, like.

Wh finite complement clauses were produced by 20 TL children (74 clauses) and 16 SLI children (55 clauses). Know was the most frequent CCV, 66% of the TL group clauses and 60% in the SLI group. Both groups used these CCVs: look, see, show, tell, wonder. The TL group used three unique CCVs: watch, say, guess, where the SLI group used five unique CCVs: discover, remember, forget, mean, like.

All children in produced at least one subordinate conjunction clause (TL group: 410; SLI group: 337). The TL group had a mean of 3.38 different subordinate conjunctions, and for the SLI group had a mean of 3.45 different subordinate conjunctions. Both groups produced subordinate conjunction clauses with after, because, before, in case, if, so, until, when, and while; even though was used only by one child with TL, and except for was used by only one child with SLI. The earliest emerging subordinate conjunctions – because, when, if – accounted for 85% of the subordinate conjunctions for the TL group and 90% of conjunctions for the SLI group.