Background and aims Difficulties with aspects of morphosyntax, phonology and/or vocabulary are the hallmark of Development Language Disorder (DLD). Yet, little is known about the linguistic-pragmatic abilities of young children with DLD. Previous studies suggest that children with DLD are experiencing difficulties with idioms, sayings and slang expressions, often interpreting them in a literal or unconventional fashion. However, it is unclear whether this is caused by difficulties to make pragmatic inferences in general or whether it stems from their semantic abilities. We therefore investigated novel metaphor understanding in young children with and without DLD. Methods We assessed novel metaphor comprehension using a reference assignment task with 15 children with DLD diagnoses (ages 42–49 months) as well as typically developing peers matched on chronological age (n = 15) and on language (n = 15). Results Children with DLD performed worse than their age-matched peers but in a comparable manner to the (younger) language-matched typically developing children. Performance was not related to non-verbal intelligence in the children with DLD. Conclusion The findings indicate that young children with DLD have difficulties with metaphor comprehension but also suggest that these difficulties are in line with their general language difficulties and linked to their overall linguistic competence rather than reflecting additional specific issues with deriving pragmatic inferences. Implications Our study adds to a growing body of literature showing that children with low language abilities are also likely to display more difficulties in understanding figurative language independently of any other symptomatology of their clinical diagnosis. It also supports the argument that deficits in the pragmatic domain are a secondary impairment rather than a core deficit in children with DLD. Nonetheless, children with DLD do show difficulties in understanding metaphors. Understanding figurative language is necessary for everyday communication and should therefore be targeted alongside traditional treatments by clinicians treating children with DLD.

中文翻译：

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对发展性语言障碍幼儿的小说隐喻的理解

背景和目标语素语法，语音和/或词汇方面的困难是发展语言障碍（DLD）的标志。然而，对患有DLD的幼儿的语言语用能力知之甚少。先前的研究表明，患有DLD的儿童在习语，俗语和语表达方面遇到困难，经常以字面或非常规的方式对其进行解释。然而，目前尚不清楚这是否是由于一般情况下进行实用推理的困难或是否源于其语义能力。因此，我们调查了有和没有DLD的幼儿的新型隐喻理解。方法我们使用参考任务分配了15名DLD诊断患儿（42-49个月）以及按年龄（n = 15）和语言（n = 15）相匹配的同龄人，评估了新的隐喻理解能力。结果DLD儿童的表现比同年龄的同龄儿童差，但与（较年轻）与语言相匹配的典型成长儿童的表现相近。DLD儿童的表现与非语言智力无关。结论研究结果表明，患有DLD的幼儿在隐喻理解方面存在困难，但也表明这些困难与他们的一般语言困难相符，并且与他们的整体语言能力有关，而不是通过实用主义推理反映出其他具体问题。启示我们的研究增加了越来越多的文献，表明语言能力低下的儿童也可能在理解比喻语言方面表现出更多的困难，而与他们临床诊断的任何其他症状无关。它还支持以下论点，即在DLD儿童中，务实领域的缺陷是继发性损伤而不是核心缺陷。尽管如此，患有DLD的儿童在理解隐喻方面确实存在困难。了解比喻性语言对于日常交流是必不可少的，因此，治疗DLD儿童的临床医生应将其与传统治疗同时作为目标。