MATRICES ESTRUCTURALES DE DEPENDENCIA DE LOS PROBLEMAS Y PRIORIZACIÓN DE LA PROBLEMÁTICA SECTORIAL

Language development was assessed on the basis of parental report of language delays or difficulties, the Denver Developmental Assessment (only among children under five years) and the British Picture Vocabulary Scale (BPVS).

As indicated in the previous section, 18 out of 75 children (almost all under five years) displayed at least one language delay in the direct assessment of their language development (24%). Ten of the children displayed more than one language delay, indicating more serious difficulties – this represents 13% of the younger age group. However, given the young age of these children, we may expect that they will exhibit some language delays, given their exposure to a language other than English prior to adoption and the later age at which they are beginning to learn English. Therefore, it is important to consider the extent to which language delays persist beyond the pre-school years into early and middle childhood.

Taking the entire group, forty percent of parents reported that their children displayed at least one language delay. The most common difficulties were language delays (23%), saying words incorrectly (18%) and

problems with understanding and processing (14%). Of particular importance is the number of children for whom these difficulties are ongoing, as illustrated in Table 5.4. Thus, of the 41 children whose parents reported language delays, these difficulties are ongoing for 20 children, and the average age of these children is 6.8 years. Similarly, parents of 24 children reported problems relating to understanding and processing – these problems are ongoing for almost all of these children, whose average age is now 9.9 years. Thus, for many of the children with language difficulties, these difficulties are not transitory in nature.

Table 5.4: Persistence of most common Language Difficulties

Nature of Difficulty Number Number for whom Mean Age (s.d) for whom

problem is ongoing problem is ongoing

Language delays 41 20 6.8 (3.7)

Saying words incorrectly 32 23 6.9 (3.2)

Problems with understanding and processing 24 22 9.9 (3.7)

A more objective indicator of language development was used, the British Picture Vocabulary Scale (BPVS)16

which is a non-verbal measure, which tests children’s understanding of commonly used English words. On the basis of the number of words that a child is able to understand, his/her score is converted into a

standardised score to enable comparison with children of the same chronological age. A standardized score of 100 indicates that a child is performing at the level expected for their age. In an average group of children, we expect that half of the children will have a mean score above 100 (indicating competence beyond their expected age level), while half of the group will have a mean standardised score below 100 (indicating competence below their expected age level).

Analysis of the group of scores indicates that 89 children were functioning at a level below their chronological age – the mean delay here was 18 months behind (s.d. = 19.07). In contrast, 77 children

performed at a level above their chronological age – the mean advantage within this group was 10 months (s.d. = 9.07).

Table 5.5 below indicates the distribution of scores within our sample of adopted children (n = 166) compared with the distribution of scores based on British samples of children.

Table 5.5: Distribution and Range of BPVS scores for Adopted Sample, and Sample of British Children

Description and Range of Score Percentage of Expected Percentage based

Children in Present on population norms for

Study (n = 166) British children

Extremely High Score (> 130) 0.0 2

Moderately High Score (115 to 129) 7.2 14

High Average Score (101 to 114) 37.3 34

Low Average Score (71 to 100) 36.1 34

Moderately Low Score (56 to 70) 8.4 14

Extremely Low Score ( < 55) 10.8 2

Analysis of scores indicates that there was no difference between the distribution of scores in the present sample and the expected percentage distribution based on population norms for British children. However, one could argue that population norms based on British children does not represent an appropriate comparison group for our sample. In light of this, the BPVS was carried out with a comparison group of school-going Irish-born children, matched with our adopted sample on age (over five years only), gender and social class background of family. Table 5.6 indicates the distribution of scores within the sample of adopted children (over five years) and a matched comparison group of Irish-born children.

Table 5.6: Distribution and Range of BPVS scores for Adopted Sample, and Comparison Group of Irish-born Children

Description and Range of Score Percentage of Adopted Percentage of Comparison

Children (n = 95) Group of Irish-born

Children (n = 95)

Extremely High Score (> 130) 0.0 1.1

Moderately High Score (115 to 129) 5.3 12.6

High Average Score (101 to 114) 41.1 46.3

Low Average Score (71 to 100) 44.2 36.8

Moderately Low Score (56 to 70) 6.3 2.1

Extremely Low Score ( < 55) 3.2 1.1

While it appears that there is a higher proportion of the adopted sample in the lower categories, and a higher proportion of the comparison group sample in the higher bands, it was not possible to test these differences statistically, as the proportions of children in each ‘cell’ were too small.

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 Per centage of Childr en above average Adopted Group

average below average

Comparison Group

However, taking the comparison and adopted groups as a whole (over five years only), analysis and comparison of the mean scores for both samples indicated that the adopted group were performing at a significantly lower level than the comparison group of Irish-born children (t = -3.408, df = 188, p < 0.001). The mean score for the adopted group was 97.89, while the mean score for the Irish-born comparison group was 103.81.

In summary, the distribution of scores within the adopted group resembles a normally distributed population, although a slightly higher number of children were performing below their chronological age than above their chronological age. Furthermore, the mean score for the adopted group was statistically and significantly lower than a matched comparison group of Irish-born children. However, these findings must be considered in light of the caveat that the majority of adopted children experienced some interruption in their natural language development.