The Open University, UK.
J Child Lang. 2013 Jan;40(1):221-43. doi: 10.1017/S0305000912000396.
Children with Down syndrome typically have weaknesses in oral language, but it has been suggested that this domain may benefit from learning to read. Amongst oral language skills, vocabulary is a relative strength, although there is some evidence of difficulties in learning the phonological form of spoken words. This study investigated the effect of orthographic support on spoken word learning with seventeen children with Down syndrome aged seven to sixteen years and twenty-seven typically developing children aged five to seven years matched for reading ability. Ten spoken nonwords were paired with novel pictures; for half the nonwords the written form was also present. The spoken word learning of both groups did not differ and benefited to the same extent from the presence of the written word. This suggests that compared to reading-matched typically developing children, children with Down syndrome are not specifically impaired in phonological learning and benefit equally from orthographic support.
患有唐氏综合征的儿童通常在口语方面存在弱点，但有研究表明，他们在学习阅读时可能会受益于这一领域。在口语技能中，词汇是相对较强的一项，尽管有证据表明他们在学习口语单词的语音形式方面存在困难。本研究调查了在十七名七至十六岁的唐氏综合征儿童和二十七名阅读能力匹配的五至七岁的典型发展儿童中，正字法支持对口语单词学习的影响。十个口语非单词与新图片配对；对于一半的非单词，书面形式也存在。两组儿童的口语单词学习没有差异，并且都从书面单词的存在中受益相同。这表明，与阅读能力匹配的典型发展儿童相比，唐氏综合征儿童在语音学习方面没有特别的障碍，并且同样受益于正字法支持。
