Praxis and memory deficits in language-impaired children

Research with adults with brain injury has suggested that the left hemisphere is specialized for language, praxis, and memory for motor acts. In children, however, the link among deficits in language, praxis, and memory has received little attention. The purpose of this study was to investigate praxis and memory skills in children identified as language impaired. Participants included 35 children (22 boys, 15 girls) between the ages of 6.0 and 10.11. Of these, 15 were in the language-impaired (LI) group and 20 were in the control group. Praxis was assessed using measures that required the participants to perform limb and orofacial gestures, and memory skills were assessed using the Wide Range Assessment of Memory and Learning (Sheslow & Adams, 1990). Results revealed that the praxis skills of the LI children were significantly poorer than those of the control children. On the tests of memory skills, the LI children were found to score loser than the control children on immediate verbal memory; visual memory was unaffected. These findings suggest that deficits in praxis, verbal memory, and language skills tend to co-occur. Further, they provide support for the idea that children with language disorders may be impaired in their performance of motor acts because they lack both the language and immediate verbal memory skills needed to encode motor acts into memory.