A new project with the participation of CINTESIS will trace the neurocognitive profile of children with Developmental Language Disorder (also known as Specific Language Impairment) in Portugal.

The researchers, including Marisa Lousada (CINTESIS/Universidade de Aveiro), will now assess the role of procedural and declarative memory in about a hundred Portuguese preschool children.

“Children with Language Developmental Disorder (or Specific Language Impairment), whose estimated prevalence is 6%, present significant changes in language of unknown cause (neurological damage, hearing loss, disturbance of intellectual development). In addition, these children often have serious difficulties in reading and writing,” explains Marisa Lousada, from CINTESIS/UA.

The researcher will collaborate in the recruitment of children with this disorder and in the supervision of the language evaluation of these children, using tools such as the ALPE Language Test.

One of the main objectives is to understand to what extent deficits in the functioning of procedural memory can contribute to the difficulties observed in this disorder and to what extent mechanisms associated with declarative memory can be mobilized to compensate for such deficits.

With this project we hope to help create more effective diagnostic and intervention strategies and prevent these children from developing Developmental Dyslexia when they enter school, as in happens in about half of the cases.

“We hope to contribute to an in-depth knowledge of Language Development Disorder. We also want to know the markers that can help identify in a timely manner the children who will present severe difficulties at school level. At the end, intervention programs for children with this disorder can be developed, in order to minimize the negative effects in school success,” says Marisa Lousada.

Led by the University of Minho, the project “Neurodevelopmental correlates of implicit-explicit learning mechanisms in children with Specific Language Impairment: Evidence with cerebral evoked potentials” whose principal investigator is Ana Paula Soares, has the participation of the University of Aveiro/CINTESIS and of the Polytechnic Institute of Porto.