Chapter published in:
Developing Narrative Comprehension: Multilingual Assessment Instrument for Narratives
Edited by Ute Bohnacker and Natalia Gagarina
[Studies in Bilingualism 61] 2020
► pp. 297–330

Bilingualism effects in the narrative comprehension of children with Developmental Language Disorder and L2-Greek

Links with language, executive function and Theory of Mind

| University of Thessaly , Greece
| University of Cologne , Germany
| University of Cambridge , United Kingdom
| University of Geneva , Switzerland
Narrative comprehension is a complex process that requires the ability to integrate language information from the speech signal with visual and contextual knowledge, while drawing also from social cognition and executive functions. Although many studies have examined narrative comprehension in typically-developing (TD) bilingual children and suggested a bilingual advantage, evidence for bilingualism effects in the narrative comprehension performance of children with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) is scant. This study explores narrative comprehension of thirty 6 to 8 year old monolingual Greek and Albanian-Greek bilingual children with DLD, along with two groups of age-matched TD monolingual Greek and Albanian-Greek bilingual children. Children’s narrative comprehension was assessed through the Greek versions of two stories (Cat and Dog) which have been designed for retelling within the Multilingual Assessment Instrument for Narratives tool (Gagarina, Klop, Kunnari, Tantele, Välimaa, Balčiūnienė, Bohnacker, & Walters, 2012) of the COST Action IS0804. The children’s language, Theory of Mind (ToM) and updating skills were independently measured. Both groups with DLD had lower language and executive function performance than TD children. Bilinguals with and without DLD, however, scored higher in narrative comprehension than their TD and DLD monolingual peers. Similarly, bilingual children with DLD outperformed their monolingual peers with DLD on the ToM task. TD children’s narrative comprehension was predicted by their language and executive function performance, while DLD bilingual children’s narrative comprehension was predicted by performance on the ToM task and their dominance in L2/Greek. The overall results indicate advantages for bilingual children with DLD in narrative comprehension and ToM, while suggesting a link between these enhanced skills.
Keywords: Developmental Language Disorder, bilingualism, narrative comprehension, executive functions, Theory of Mind
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
    • 1.1Narrative comprehension and language ability
    • 1.2Narrative comprehension and executive functions
    • 1.3Narrative comprehension and Theory of Mind
  • 2.Aims and research questions
  • 3.Method
    • 3.1Participants
    • 3.2General procedure
    • 3.3Materials and procedure
      • 3.3.1Narrative task
      • 3.3.2Language ability tests
        • Expressive vocabulary in Greek
        • Sentence Repetition Task (SRT)
      • 3.3.3Executive function: 2-back task
      • 3.3.4Online video verification first-order false belief (ToM) task
    • 3.4Analysis plan
  • 4.Results
    • 4.1Narrative task
    • 4.2Language Ability tests
    • 4.3Executive function: 2-back task
    • 4.4Online video verification first-order false belief task
    • 4.5Narrative comprehension, age, language dominance and independent language ability, executive function and ToM assessments
  • 5.Discussion
  • 6.Conclusions
  • Acknowledgements
  • Note
  • References
Published online: 10 December 2020
https://doi.org/10.1075/sibil.61.10per
References
Alloway, T. P., & Gathercole, S. E.
(2005) The role of sentence recall in reading and language skills of children with learning difficulties. Learning and Individual Differences, 15(4), 271–282. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Altman, C., Armon-Lotem, S., Fichman, S., & Walters, J.
(2016) Macrostructure, microstructure, and mental state terms in the narratives of English – Hebrew bilingual preschool children with and without specific language impairment. Applied Psycholinguistics, 37(1), 165–193. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
American Psychiatric Association
(2013) Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders. Washington, DC. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Andreou, M.
(2015) The effects of bilingualism on verbal and non verbal cognition: The micro- and macro-structure of narratives in the weak and the dominant language of the bilingual child (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Aristotle University of Thessaloniki.Google Scholar
Astington, J. W., & Jenkins, J. M.
(1999) A longitudinal study of the relation between language and theory-of-mind development. Developmental Psychology, 35(5), 1311–1320. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Atkinson, L., Slade, L., Powell, D., & Levy, J. P.
(2017) Theory of mind in emerging reading comprehension: A longitudinal study of early indirect and direct effects. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 164, 225–238. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Bialystok, E., & Craik, F. I. M.
(2010) Cognitive and linguistic processing in the bilingual mind. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 19(1), 19–23. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Bialystok, E., & Senman, S.
(2004) Executive processes in appearance-reality tasks: The role of inhibition of attention and symbolic representation. Child Development, 75(2), 562–579. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Blom, E., & Boerma, T.
(2016) Why do children with language impairment have difficulties with narrative macrostructure? Research in Developmental Disabilities, 55, 301–311. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Bloom, L., & Lahey, M.
(1978) Language development and language disorders. New York, NY: Wiley & Sons.Google Scholar
Boerma, T., Leseman, P., Timmermeister, M., Wijnen, F., & Blom, E.
(2016) Narrative abilities of monolingual and bilingual children with and without language impairment: Implications for clinical practice. Journal of Language and Communication Disorders, 5(6), 626–638. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Bohnacker, U.
(2016) Tell me a story in English or Swedish: Narrative production and comprehension in bilingual preschoolers and first graders. Applied Psycholinguistics, 37(1), 19–48. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Chondrogianni, V., Andreou, M., Nerantzini, M., Varlokosta, S., & Tsimpli, I. M.
(2013) The Greek Sentence Repetition Task. COST Action IS0804.Google Scholar
Chrysochoou, E., & Bablekou, Z.
(2011) Phonological loop and central executive contributions to oral comprehension skills of 5.5 to 7.5 years old children. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 25(4), 576–583. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Coady, J. A.
(2013) Rapid naming by children with and without specific language impairment. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 56(2), 604–617. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Daneman, M., & Blennerhassett, A.
(1984) How to assess the listening comprehension skills of prereaders. Journal of Educational Psychology, 76(6), 1372–1381. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
de Villiers, J. G., & de Villiers, P. A.
(2000) Linguistic determinism and the understanding of false beliefs. In P. Mitchell & K. Riggs (Eds.), Children’s reasoning and the mind (pp. 189–226). Hove: Psychology Press.Google Scholar
Dennett, D. C.
(Eds.) (1978) Brainstorms: Philosophical essays on mind and psychology. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
Dodwell, K., & Bavin, E. L.
(2008) Children with specific language impairment: An investigation of their narratives and memory. International Journal of Communication and Language Disorders, 43(2), 201–218. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Engel de Abreu, P. M. J., Cruz-Santos, A., & Puglisi, M. L.
(2014) Specific language impairment in language-minority children from low-income families. Journal of Language & Communication Disorders, 49(6), 736–747. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Ensminger, M. E., & Fothergill, K. E.
(2003) A decade of measuring SES: what it tells us and where to go from here. In M. H. Bornstein & R. H. Bradley (Eds.), Socioeconomic status, parenting and child development (pp. 13–27). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
Farrant, B.
(2015) Specific language impairment and perspective taking: Delayed development of theory of mind, visual and emotional perspective taking. Journal of Childhood and Developmental Disorders, 1(8).Google Scholar
Florit, E., Roch, M., Altoe, G., & Levorato, M. C.
(2009) Listening comprehension in preschoolers: The role of memory. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 27(4), 935–951. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Florit, E., Roch, M., & Levorato, M. C.
(2011) Listening text comprehension of explicit and implicit information in preschoolers: The role of verbal and inferential skills. Discourse Processes, 48(2), 119–138. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2013) The relationship between listening comprehension of text and sentences in preschoolers: Specific or mediated by lower- and higher-level components? Applied Psycholinguistics, 34(2), 395–415. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Ford, J. A., & Milosky, L. M.
(2003) Inferring emotional reactions in social situations: differences in children with language impairment. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 46(1), 21–30. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Forgeot d’ Arc, B., & Ramus, F.
(2010) Belief attribution despite verbal interference. The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 64(5), 975–990. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Friedman, N. P., & Miyake, A.
(2004) The relations among inhibition and interference control functions: A latent-variable analysis. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 133(1), 101–135. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Gagarina, N., Klop, D., Kunnari, S., Tantele, K., Välimaa, T., Balčiūnienė, I., Bohnacker, U., & Walters, J.
(2012) MAIN: Multilingual Assessment Instrument for Narratives. ZAS Papers in Linguistics, 56. Berlin: Leibniz Zentrum für Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft.Google Scholar
Georgas, J., Paraskevopoulos, I. N., Besevegis, E., Giannitsas, N., & Mylonas, K.
(2003) Greece. In J. Georgas, L. G. Weiss, F. J. R. van de Vijver, & D. H. Saklofske (Eds.), Culture and children’s intelligence: Cross-cultural analysis of the WISC-III (pp. 199–214). San Diego, CA: Academic Press. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Gillott, A., Furniss, F., & Walter, A.
(2004) Theory of mind ability in children with specific language impairment. Child Language Teaching and Therapy, 20(1), 1–11. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Goetz, P. J.
(2003) The effects of bilingualism on theory of mind development. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 6(1), 1–15. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Hoff, E., Laursen, B., & Tardif, T.
(2002) Socioeconomic status and parenting. In M. Bornstein (Eds.), Handbook of parenting, Vol. 2: Biology and ecology of parenting, (pp. 231–252). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
Karasinski, C., & Ellis Weismer, S.
(2010) Comprehension of inferences in discourse processing by adolescents with and without language impairment. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 53(5), 1268–1279. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Kidd, E.
(2013) The role of verbal working memory in children’s sentence comprehension: A critical review. Topics in Language Disorders, 33(3), 208–233. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Kim, Y. S. G.
(2016) Direct and mediated effects of language and cognitive skills on comprehension of oral narrative texts (listening comprehension) for children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 141, 101–120. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Laloi, A., de Jong, J., & Baker, A.
(2017) Can executive functioning contribute to the diagnosis of SLI in bilingual children? Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, 7(3), 431–459. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Leonard, L. B.
(1998) Children with specific language impairment. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
Lepola, J., Lynch, J., Laakkonen, E., Silvén, M., & Niemi, P.
(2012) The role of inference making and other language skills in the development of narrative listening comprehension in 4- to 6-year-old children. Reading Research Quarterly, 47(3), 259–282. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Lukács, Á., Ladányi, E., Fazekas, K., & Kemény, F.
(2016) Executive functions and the contribution of short-term memory span in children with Specific Language Impairment. Neuropsychology, 30(3), 296–303. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Lynch, J. S., & van den Broek, P.
(2007) Understanding the glue of narrative structure: children’s on- and off-line inferences about characters’ goals. Cognitive Development, 22(3), 323–340. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Marton, K.
(2008) Visuo-spatial processing and executive functions in children with specific language impairment. International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders, 43(2), 181–200. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Marton, K., Campanelli, L., Eichorn, N., Scheuer, J., & Yoon, J.
(2014) Information processing and proactive interference in children with and without specific language impairment. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 57(1), 106–119. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Mattheoudakis, M., Chatzidaki, A., & Maligkoudi, C.
(2014) Bilingual education & types of bilingualism. Paper presented at the Workshop “Language Knowledge and Development in native and non-native speakers”, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece.
Maviş, I., Tunçer, M., & Gagarina, N.
(2016) Macrostructure components in narrations of Turkish–German bilingual children. Applied Psycholinguistics, 37(1), 69–89. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Miller, C. A.
(2001) False belief understanding in children with specific language impairment. Journal of Communication Disorders, 34(1–2), 73–86. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Nilsson, K. K., & de López, K. J.
(2016) Theory of Mind in children with specific language impairment: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Child Development, 87(1), 143–153. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Oakhill, J. V., Hartt, J., & Samols, D.
(2005) Levels of comprehension monitoring and working memory in good and poor comprehenders. Reading and Writing, 18(7–9), 657–686. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Otwinowska, A., Mieszkowska, K., Białecka-Pikul, M., Opacki, M., & Haman, E.
(2018) Retelling a model story improves the narratives of Polish-English bilingual children. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 1–25. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Pelegrina, S., Lechuga, M. T., García-Madruga, J. A., Elosúa, M. R., Macizo, P., Carreiras, M., Fuentes, L. J., & Bajo, M. T.
(2015) Normative data on the n-back task for children and young adolescents. Frontiers in Psychology, 6, 1544. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Peristeri, E., Baldimtsi, E., Tsimpli, I. M., & Durrleman, S.
(2019) Bilingualism effects in children with Developmental Language Disorder: Metalinguistic awareness, executive functions, and false-belief reasoning. In M. M. Brown, & B. Dailey (Eds.), BUCLD 43: Proceedings of the 43rd annual Boston University Conference on Language Development (pp. 549–560). Boston, MA: Cascadilla Press.Google Scholar
Renfrew, C.
(1997) Word Finding Vocabulary Test (The Renfrew Language Scales). Oxford: Winslow Press.Google Scholar
Rezzonico, S., Chen, X., Cleave, P., Greenberg, J., Hipfner-Boucher, K., Johnson, C., & Girolametto, L.
(2015) Oral narratives in monolingual and bilingual preschoolers with SLI. International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders, 50(6), 830–841. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Riches, N. G.
(2012) Sentence repetition in children with specific language impairment: An investigation of underlying mechanisms. International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders, 47(5), 499–510. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Schneider, W., Eschman, A., & Zuccolotto, A.
(2012) E-Prime user’s guide. Pittsburgh, PA: Psychology Software Tools.Google Scholar
Spanoudis, G.
(2016) Theory of mind and specific language impairment in school-age children. Journal of Communication Disorders, 61, 83–96. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Stavrakaki, S., & Tsimpli, I. M.
(2000) Diagnostiko test glossikis noimosinis gia pedia prosholikis ke sholikis ilikias: stathmisi, statistiki analisi ke psihometrikes idiotites. [Diagnostic Verbal IQ Test for Greek preschool and school age children: standardization, statistical analysis, and psychometric properties]. In M. Glykas, & G. Kalomiris (Eds.), Proceedings of the 8th conference of the Pan-Hellenic Association of Speech and Language Therapists (pp. 95–106). Athens: Ellinika Grammata.Google Scholar
Stokes, S. F., Wong, A. M. Y., Fletcher, P., & Leonard, L. B.
(2006) Nonword repetition and sentence repetition as clinical markers of specific language impairment: The case of Cantonese. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 49(2), 219–236. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Strasser, K., & del Rio, F.
(2014) The role of comprehension monitoring, Theory of Mind, and vocabulary depth in predicting story comprehension and recall of kindergarten children. Reading Research Quarterly, 49(2), 169–187. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Theodorou, E.
(2013) Specific Language Impairment in CYPRIOT Greek: Diagnostic and experimental investigations (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). University of Cyprus.Google Scholar
Tsimpli, I. M., Peristeri, E., & Andreou, M.
(2016) Narrative production in monolingual and bilingual children with Specific Language Impairment. Applied Psycholinguistics, 37(1), 195–216. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2017) Clitic production in monolingual and bilingual children with Specific Language Impairment: Evidence from elicitation and narrative tasks. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, 7(3–4), 394–430. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Unsworth, S.
(2013) UBILEC: Utrecht bilingual language exposure calculator (Unpublished manuscript).Google Scholar
Vissers, C., Koolen, S., Hermans, D., Scheper, A., & Knoors, H.
(2015) Executive functioning in preschoolers with specific language impairment. Frontiers in Psychology, 6, 1574. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Vogindroukas, I., Protopapas, A., & Sideridis, G.
(2009) Expressive vocabulary assessment (Greek version of Renfrew Word Finding Vocabulary Test). Chania, Crete: Glafki.Google Scholar
Was, C. A., & Woltz, D. J.
(2007) Reexamining the relationship between working memory and comprehension: The role of available long-term memory. Journal of Memory and Language, 56(1), 86–102. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Wechsler, D.
(1992) WISC-III: Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children – Third Edition: Manual (Australian adaptation). San Antonio, TX: Psychological Corporation.Google Scholar
Wild-Wall, N., Falkenstein, M., & Gajewski, P. D.
(2011) Age-related differences in working memory performance in a 2-back task. Frontiers in Psychology, 2, 186. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Ziatas, K., Durkin, K., & Pratt, C.
(1998) Belief term development in children with autism, Asperger syndrome, specific language impairment, and normal development: Links to theory of mind development. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 39(5), 755–763. CrossrefGoogle Scholar