Dichotic listening in children with serious language problems.

20 children with serious language problems (mainly expressive) were tested with the Dichotic Listening (DL) test for language laterality. 16 were right-handed and 4 left-handed. The dichotic test consisted of series of pairwise presentations of CVC-syllables with "target-syllables" that should be detected interspersed among "distractors." The child pointed to a sheet of paper on which a picture representing the targets (and distractors) was printed. In addition, the children were tested on several expressive and impressive language tests and on finger-tapping. Analysis showed an increased frequency of subjects with a left-ear advantage (LEA) and a reduced amplitude of the right-ear advantage (REA) for those subjects showing a right-ear advantage. Correlations with the language variables and with finger-tapping are presented and discussed.