Abstrakt
We examined how sentence imitation is related to language ability (indexed by elicited production and sentence comprehension) and working memory (phonological short-term memory and central executive, examined by nonword repetition and listening span). The target sentences for language tasks included relative clauses and simple sentences with adjectival nominal phrase.
Sixty-three Czech children with developmental language disorder (6;5-9;6) and language-matched controls (3;7-6;7) participated. Regression analysis showed that the control children were more proficient in sentence imitation, that the relative clauses were more difficult, and that the number of errors decreased with better scores in listening span, nonword repetition, and sentence comprehension in both groups.
The effect of elicited production on sentence imitation was stronger in the typically developing children. Overall, the results indicate that sentence imitation measures language skills and it also reflects the phonological and working memory.