Manchester language study: young adulthood

<p>Abstract copyright data collection owner.</p>Dataset of interview and questionnaire data resulting from the age 24 wave with the original participants of the Manchester Language Study in adulthood (24 years of age). The Manchester Language Study is a longitudinal study of a national random sample of all children who were attending language units. The study covers a 20 year period. It began in 1995 when the children were 7 years of age. In this young adulthood phase we undertook interviews with 84 participants with a history of Language Impairment (LI) and a comparison group of 88 age-matched peers (AMP) who had no history of special educational needs or speech and language therapy provision. We also collected data via questionnaires from a close relative or friend they nominated themselves. Missing values(216) are dropouts from previous waves. The interviews were extensive covering personal and social functioning and societal engagement. The personal domain includes general health (weight, exercise, leisure, diet, smoking, alcohol, drugs), mental health (anxiety, depression) and educational/training qualifications. The social domain includes personal relationships (marital status, children, friendships, stable partnerships, parents, siblings) and social adjustment (aggression/criminality). Societal engagement includes employment (including occupational adjustment), independence (living context, transport, driving), finances (banking, financial literacy, debt, gambling, receipt of benefits) civic participation (voting, volunteering), TV viewing and new media use (computers, mobile phones). Research activity includes (1) the identification of the range and profile of personal, social and societal (PSS) functioning in young adults with a history of LI, (2) the examination of concurrent relationships among individuals’ attributes, environmental factors and PSS functioning leading to a number of discoveries, for example, the discovery that prosociality is one of the key protective factor associated with most areas of functioning in individuals with LI in young adulthood and (3) the identification of predictors of distinct development pathways of adjustment in social, emotional, behavioural and employment/education outcomes in young adulthood. <p>Project description:</p>Language impairment (LI) affects one in fifteen children in the UK. LI involves problems with talking and with understanding spoken language. These difficulties are usually not transient. However, there is limited information about how these children “turn out” in adulthood. This project aims to fill this knowledge gap. It is based on the Manchester Language Study, the largest UK study of individuals with a history of SLI. The original cohort was a random sample of all 7 year old children who were attending language units in England in 1995. These individuals participated in this project when they were aged between 23-25 years of age. A range of areas of functioning were examined in adulthood, in the personal, social and societal domains. For example: general health (exercise, diet), personal relationships, education, employment, finances, and civic participation (voting, volunteering). Quantitative as well as qualitative data was gathered via direct assessment, participants’ self-reports, reports from significant others, and consultation with national records. The project identifies pathways to positive adjustment (resilience) as well as risk pathways in adulthood