Indicators for Building a Norm-Referenced Dataset Based on Conversational Language Samples in Typical Mandarin-speaking Children: An Exploratory Study

For proper assessment, diagnosis, and treatment of language disorders in Mandarin children, it is important to have measures that closely track the course of normal development. The current study uses a large collection of spontaneous conversational language samples to track the developmental course of five language measures: mean length of utterance (MLU), the MLU of the five longest utterances (MLU5), vocD, number of repetitions, and number of retracings. We used cross-validation-based linear regression to estimate the relationship between age, gender and each of the five variables derived from the conversational language samples in 101 typically developing Mandarin-speaking children aged 3 to 7. Each of the five measures showed significant age-related effects during the period from age 3 to age 7. As norm-referenced measures of language development in children speaking Mandarin, these developmental data could inform clinical therapists regarding assessments and interventions for children with language disorder or impairment.