Evidence for differential hemispheric function in children with hemiplegic cerebral palsy.

Eight children with right infantile hemiplegia and eight with left infantile hemiplegia were compared with each other and with 13 sibling controls on a test of manual dexterity, an extended neurological examination and a battery of neuropsychological tests. Right-hemiplegic children performed significantly less well than left-hemiplegic children and the controls on measures of syntactical awareness and the repetition of semantically coherent materials, despite similar verbal IQs. Both hemiplegic groups tended to perform less well than the controls, although not significantly so, on the short-term memory task, repetition of digits, and on a task of confrontation naming. There was also a strong correlation between left-hand impairment and poor arithmetical computation skill in both hemiplegic groups, which conforms with present views as to right-lateralization of certain mathematical functions. The results as a whole support the premise that there is innate hemispheric organization for some language tasks.