MORPHOSYNTACTIC STRUCTURES IN THE SPOKEN LANGUAGE OF OLDER CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS

This study examined the effects of age and gender on 8-, 11-, 14-, and 17-year-old children and adolescents' uses of the eight morphosyntact ic features included in the Developmental Sentence Scoring (DSS) proce dure, the total DSS score, and the DSS sentence point score. No gender -related differences or interactions between gender and age were ident ified. However, age had a significant effect for eight of the 10 DSS m easures. These eight measures were: indefinite pronouns/noun modifiers , personal pronouns, main verbs, negatives, conjunctions, interrogativ e reversals, wh-questions, and the total DSS score. For these eight, a t least one of the three older groups, most often the Ii-year-old grou p, received higher scores than the 8-year-olds. The study also explore d whether frequency of use of the eight morphosyntactic features and/o r the developmental complexity of the features that were used contribu ted to the identified age-related differences in morphosyntactic use. For the most part, frequency of use was the primary factor accounting for differences. A developmental pattern characterized by spurts and r egressions was commonly observed across the age groups. Findings are r elated to other research on later language development. The need for f uture research to address issues related to language sampling and anal ysis methods specifically appropriate for older children and adolescen ts is highlighted.