Fast mapping short and long words: Examining the influence of phonological short-term memory and receptive vocabulary in children with developmental language disorder

Purpose: To investigate factors that influence word learning in children with developmental language disorder (DLD).

Method: The participants were 23 children with DLD and 26 typically developing (TD) children, aged five. Participants completed a fast mapping task (assessed using a production measure), as well as tests of nonword repetition and receptive vocabulary. We explored the effect of word length on nonword repetition and fast mapping abilities while controlling for receptive vocabulary skills.

Results: The results indicate that children with DLD demonstrate significant difficulties accurately repeating nonwords of all lengths relative to their TD peers. Children with DLD also exhibited significant difficulties with fast mapping, especially when learning longer novel words.

Conclusions: Our findings indicate that children with DLD demonstrate an impaired capacity to encode phonological information; however, this differentially impacts their nonword repetition and fast mapping abilities. TD children may more effectively take advantage of receptive vocabulary to support performance on these tasks.

Learning outcomes: Readers will understand how phonological short-term memory and receptive vocabulary contribute to fast mapping in children with DLD and in TD children.