Socioeconomic disparities in early language development in two Norwegian samples

Socioeconomic disparities in early language are widespread and have long-lasting effects. The aim of this study is to investigate when social gaps in language problems arise and how they change across the first years of schooling. We address this question in two large longitudinal Norwegian datasets: the Behavior Outlook Norwegian Developmental Study (BONDS) and the Norwegian Mother, Father and Child Cohort Study (MoBa). Despite some slight differences across the two samples, we found that children from higher social backgrounds are less likely to have language difficulties starting from age 18 months and up to age 8 (grade 2). Moreover, while early language problems are strongly predictive of later language, maternal education makes an additional contribution to explaining language difficulties at the beginning of school life. Social inequality in language development arises early, even in a country like Norway, with low unemployment and one of the most egalitarian societies in Europe.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

Associations between language difficulties, peer victimization, and bully perpetration from 3 through 8 years of age : results From a population-based study

Background and Purpose: Schoolchildren with language difficulties experience more peer victimization compared to their typically developing (TD) peers. Whether these children also bully their peers (bully perpetration) more than TD children is unclear. Furthermore, little is known about peer victimization and bully perpetration among preschool children with language difficulties and how it may be related to different paths of language difficulties. This study aimed to investigate associations between language difficulties, peer victimization, and bully perpetration from preschool to school age as well as the risk of peer victimization and bully perpetration for children with different developmental paths of language difficulties and mild language difficulties compared to TD children. Method: The sample was drawn from the Norwegian Mother, Father and Child Cohort Study. Participants with completed questionnaires at 3, 5, and 8 years of age (n = 22,628) were included. Paths between latent variables of language skills at 3, 5, and 8 years of age, peer victimization at 5 and 8 years of age, and bully perpetration at 8 years of age were examined with structural equation modeling. Logistic regression was used to investigate peer victimization and bully perpetration for predefined paths of language difficulties. Results: Poor language skills at 3 and 5 years of age were associated with peer victimization at 5 years of age. Poor language skills at 5 and 8 years of age were associated with peer victimization and bully perpetration at 8 years of age. The association between poor language skills at 5 years of age and bully perpetration at 8 years of age was stronger for girls. Persistent paths of language difficulties at 3, 5, and 8 years of age showed the highest risk of peer victimization and bully perpetration. Conclusions: Language difficulties are associated with peer victimization and bully perpetration. The risk of peer victimization and bully perpetration differs according to different developmental paths of language difficulties from preschool to school age

Language, motor skills and behavior problems in preschool years

Child language development is a complex process. This process cannot be understood without considering its relationship to other developmental domains. Language development in preschool years is associated with development of motor skills and behavior problems, and these associations are the focus of the current thesis. Despite a large number of studies examining the co-occurrence of such developmental delays and problems, few studies have examined the developmental relationship between these areas during preschool years in a population-based sample. The first aim (paper 1) is therefore to look at how variation in typical development of language skills and motor skills is related. We especially want to explore whether the developmental paths for language and motor skills are characterized by stability or change in early childhood (1.5 to 3 of age). The second aim (paper 2) is to follow up results from paper 1 later in preschool years (3 to 5 years of age). Further, we want to look at how much of the variation in language skills can be explained by motor skills and vice versa. The third aim (paper 3) is to investigate the causal direction of the co-occurrence of language delay and externalizing behavior problems. The relationship between difficulties in these two domains is well established, but few studies have tried to estimate the causal relationship between them. Our hypothesis is that there would be differences in causal directions for the relationship between language delay and two separate subdomains of externalizing problems, aggression and inattention, respectively. For the purpose of the three papers included in this thesis, questionnaire data from three waves of the population based, longitudinal Mother and Child Cohort Study (MoBa) are utilized. Mothers’ reports were collected when children were 1.5, 3 and 5 years of age. Paper 1 includes data on 62,944 children from the first two waves of data collection. Paper 2 includes data from the two last waves, and paper 3 includes data from all three waves. In paper 2 and 3, mother reports on 25,474 children are included in the analyses. In paper 1 and paper 2 we used cross lagged panel models for investigating the autoregressive and cross-lagged associations between language and motor skills. Results from paper 1 show that both communication and motor skills were quite stable over time (communication skills: .40, motor skills: .80), with motor skills being significantly more stable than communication skills. However, whereas communication skills do not positively predict motor skills, motor skills are an equally strong predictor of future communication (.38) as motor skills. We conclude that the communication skills at this age are not a reliable predictor for later motor development, whereas motor skills are. Communication and motor skills are correlated at this early age, but we argue that variation in what is considered normal language development at 1½ years is too wide to predict variation in motor skills at later stages. In paper 2 we go on to study the relations between language and a subdivision of gross and fine motor skills between the ages of 3 and 5 years, in order to understand whether one aspects of motor skills would be more predictive of language than the other, and whether language would be predictive of motors skills at this later age. The estimated models of the relationship between language and the two domains of motor skills correspond to the one presented in paper 1. Both domains are characterized by modest to high stability rather than change (language skills: .80, gross motor skills: .56, fine motor skills: .43). However, in contrast to results from paper 1, language skills at 3 years of age have significant influence on change in both gross and fine motor skills over time, whereas motor skills no longer significantly predict later language skills. We go on to calculate how much of the shared variance is explained specifically by language and gross and fine motor skills, respectively. Results from these analyses suggest that variance explained by language alone decreases, whereas variance explained by motor skills alone increases from 3 to 5 years of age. We conclude that these domains of development are best described as specific at this age. Seen together, results from paper 1 and paper 2 indicate stability in both domains, but also some variability across domains. Motor skills are highly stable from 1.5 to 3 years of age, and motor skills at 1.5 years predict later language skills. From 3 to 5 years of age language skills show higher stability than motor skills, and language skills at 3 years predict later both gross and fine motor skills. In paper 3, we change focus from variation in typical development to differences between delayed and typical development. Children with language delay are thought to be at risk for a spectrum of co-occurring difficulties, and in this paper, we investigate the causal relationship between language delay and inattention and aggression, respectively. We include data from all three waves in fixed effects models. The results show that the causal relationship between language delay and inattention is quite different from the relationship between language delay and aggression. Whereas the first is explained by common factors and a reciprocal relationship between the two, the best fitting model for the relationship between language and aggression is one where language delay predicts aggression, and not the other way around. We conclude that our results support different etiologies for the relationship between language delay and inattention and aggression, respectively. Findings from the three papers highlight the importance of knowledge about developmental change in preschool years. These findings underline the value of utilizing data from more than one measurement occasion in order to capture how language skills are related to co-occurring skills in young children. Also, estimating different outcomes simultaneously, in the same study population enable the possibility to compare parameters directly. The results also have implications for prevention and intervention. Co-occurrence of symptoms is common in preschool years and changes happen rapidly. What is considered normal at one point in time quickly changes to being abnormal at another time point. When assessing young children with language delays, it is important to be aware of the difficulties this child could have in other areas. Knowledge about how symptoms of different developmental delays influence each other over time is essential to adapt treatment strategies to each individual child. It is therefore important that clinicians follow development in more than one area closely, as both co-occurrence of symptoms, and a change in presentation of symptoms are common

Associations between language disorders and symptoms of socio-emotional behavioural problems in 3-year-old children

Children with communication-disorders are “at risk” of additional problems in social, emotional and behavioural development. Speech and language are intimately involved with other areas of development. Thus it might be expected that children with a significant handicap in this area of development would be handicapped in other areas of development as well. Research is needed to further explore the nature of the relationship. It was proposed that children with language disorders would have disproportionately high rates of socio-emotional behavioural difficulties. The sample was from the Autism Birth Cohort-study (ABC-study), a sub-study of the Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort (MoBa). Participants were recruited into the MoBa study. Parents completed questionnaires that screened for social and communication disorders at 36 months. Children who screened positive were invited for a full clinical assessment. In addition a control group of randomly drawn children from all participants in MoBa were invited for assessment. This study includes 35 children diagnosed with a language disorder as well as 25 children from the control group (mean age 42 months). Analysis of children’s language in a mother-child play situation was conducted. Measures of intelligibility (INT) and mean length of utterance (MLU) were compared to socio-emotional behaviour as measured by the Preschool Age Psychiatric Assessment (PAPA). An weak association between language disorders and socio-emotional difficulties was found. Exploring the relationship further results showed that a receptive-expressive language disorder in combination with low intelligibility were a risk-marker of externalising behaviour problems. Children with three or more symptoms of externalising behaviours in addition to low intelligibility were at risk of internalising behaviour problems

The role of ECEC teachers for the long-term social and academic adjustment of children with early externalizing difficulties: a prospective cohort study

Using data from more than 7000 children from the Norwegian Mother, Father and Child (MoBa) study, this study explored the role of school readiness and teacher–child closeness in the early child education and care (ECEC) setting for the prospective academic and social development of children with early externalizing problems. Mother, ECEC teachers, and schoolteacher ratings were applied. Latent moderated mediation analyses within a SEM framework were performed. Early externalizing problems at age three were associated with less school readiness at age five, but this association was weaker among children with closer teacher–child relationships. School readiness mediated the link from early externalizing problems to later academic and social adjustment difficulties, but this long-term indirect effect also decreased with increasing levels of teacher–child closeness. With regards to intervention efforts, the study demonstrates the potentially important role of ECEC teachers for the long-term social and academic adjustment of children with early externalizing problems

Associations between poor gross and fine motor skills in pre-school and peer victimization concurrently and longitudinally with follow-up in school age – results from a population-based study

Background Children with poor motor skills are at increased risk of peer victimization. However, it is unclear whether poor gross and fine motor skills are differently linked to peer victimization among pre-school and schoolchildren. Aims To investigate associations between poor gross and fine motor skills measured in pre-school and the associations to peer victimization measured concurrently and in school age. Sample Data from the Norwegian Mother, Father and Child Cohort Study (MoBa), and the Medical Birth Registry of Norway were used. Participants with complete questionnaires at 3, 5, and 8 years (n = 23 215) were included. Methods A longitudinal design and an autoregressive cross-lagged model were used to investigate if poor gross and fine motor skills at 3 and 5 years predicted peer victimization at 5 and 8 years. Because emotional difficulties are associated with both motor skills and peer victimization, the results were adjusted for emotional difficulties. Results Only poor fine motor skills at 3 years had a significant association to peer victimization at 5 years. Poor gross motor skills at 5 years had a stronger association to peer victimization measured concurrently compared to poor fine motor skills, and only poor fine motor skills at 5 years was significantly linked to peer victimization at 8 years. No gender difference was found between these paths. Conclusions Teachers and parents should be aware that motor skills predict peer victimization, and that poor gross and fine motor skills have different associations to peer victimization measured at different ages

Children’s temperament moderates the long-term effects of pedagogical practices in ECEC on children’s externalising problems

In this study, we explored how free play and scaffolding practices in Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) related to children’sexternalising problems both in ECEC and later in school.Furthermore, we aimed to reduce the knowledge gap of whether these relations depended on children’s differences in emotional temperament. We used structural equation modelling to analysedata from 7421 children from the Norwegian Mother, Father an dChild Cohort Study. Results indicated that more free playassociated with less externalising problems in ECEC for children ingeneral. For children with higher emotionality, more free playrelated to increased externalising problems in school. Scaffoldingin ECEC was not associated with externalising problems, butmoderated the longitudinal association of free play for children with higher emotionality. All children benefited from free play in ECEC for their concurrent mental health. However, for childrenwith higher emotionality, more free play in ECEC might be a riskfactor for reduced mental health in school, where there is lessfree play than in ECEC. More scaffolding in combination with freeplay in ECEC can reduce this risk. Further research should addressthe content of play and scaffolding practices in more detail