PURPOSE The present study was designed to investigate persistence in preschool children with developmental language disorder (DLD) compared to similar-age peers with typical language (TL) on tasks designed to be moderately challenging, yet equivalent in difficulty for both groups. METHOD Sixteen preschool-age children with DLD were matched to 16 children with TL based on chronological age, biological sex, and maternal education. The children completed two play-based tasks that were designed to elicit some success but impossible to complete. Task persistence was measured by the total time spent attempting to complete each unachievable task. RESULTS Despite equivalent task difficulty for both groups, the children with DLD exhibited less persistence than the TL group. This reduced persistence behavior on the part of the DLD group was a generalized and not a task-specific response. CONCLUSIONS Despite experiencing the same degree of success on moderately challenging play-based tasks, the children in the DLD group exhibited reduced task persistence relative to the TL group. Potential implications for reduced persistence for children with DLD are discussed.

中文翻译：

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调查患有发育性语言障碍的学龄前儿童的任务持久性。


目的 本研究旨在调查患有发育性语言障碍 （DLD） 的学龄前儿童与具有典型语言 （TL） 的同龄人相比，在两组具有中等挑战性但难度相等的任务中的持久性。方法 根据实际年龄、生理性别和母亲教育程度，将 16 例学龄前 DLD 儿童与 16 例 TL 儿童进行匹配。孩子们完成了两项基于游戏的任务，这些任务旨在获得一些成功，但无法完成。任务持久性是通过尝试完成每个无法完成的任务所花费的总时间来衡量的。结果 尽管两组的任务难度相同，但 DLD 患儿的持久性低于 TL 组。DLD 组的这种降低持久性行为是一种通用的响应，而不是特定于任务的响应。结论 尽管在中等挑战性的基于游戏的任务上取得了相同程度的成功，但相对于 TL 组，DLD 组的儿童表现出任务持久性降低。讨论了 DLD 儿童持久性降低的潜在影响。