4Vocabulary Comprehension by Down Syndrome Adolescents

This study probed whether or not a distinctive Down syndrome (DS) pattern could be found in the realm of vocabulary comprehension. Groups of 29 each of DS adolescents, non-DS mentally retarded (MR) adolescents, and nonretarded children were statistically matched on receptive vocabulary ability; DS and MR groups were also matched for chronological age. The DS and MR groups had mean caronological ages of 209.6 and 209.8 months, respectively. The mean chronological age of the nonretarded group was 62.6 months; the mean age equivalc.nce scores of the two adolescent groups were 56.7 months (D9) and 57.9 months (MR). Subjects were tested on the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-Revised, a nonverbal test of receptive language. Multivariate analyses indicated that DS anti MR grcups did not differ in understanding of the words in any category and in fact showed higher levels of comprehension than the nonretarded group in two categories, implying that DS individuals do not show specific deficiencies in vocabulary comprehension. (PB) Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document