Associations between early efficiency in language processing and learning outcomes in children born full term and preterm: Similarities and differences

Associations between children’s early language processing efficiency and later verbal and non-verbal outcomes shed light on the extent to which early information processing skills support later learning across different domains of function. Examining whether the strengths of associations are similar in typically developing and at-risk populations provides an additional lens into the varying routes to learning that children may take across development. In this follow-up study, children born full-term (FT) and preterm (PT) (n=94, 49 FT, 45 PT) were assessed in the Looking While Listening (LWL) task at 18 months (corrected for degree of prematurity in PT group). This eye-tracking task assesses efficiency of real-time spoken language comprehension in terms of accuracy and speed (RT) of processing. At 4 ½ years, children were assessed on standardized tests of receptive vocabulary, expressive language, and non-verbal IQ. Language processing efficiency was associated with the two language outcomes (r2-change ranged from 7.0 to 19.7%, p < 0.01), controlling for age at test and SES. Birth group did not moderate the effects on language skills, suggesting similar mechanisms of learning in these domains for PT and FT children. However, birth group moderated the association between speed and non-verbal IQ (r2 change 4.5, p < 0.05), such that an association was found in the PT but not the FT group. This finding suggests that information processing skills reflected in efficiency of real-time language processing may be recruited to support learning in a broader range of domains in the PT compared to the FT group.