I remembered the chorm! Word learning abilities of children with and without phonological impairment.

What is already known on the subject There is limited research examining the word learning abilities of children with phonological impairment. Most previous research focuses on word properties such as phonotactic probability and neighbourhood density. Within the existing literature there are different reports and conclusions regarding the word learning abilities of children with phonological impairment and whether their word learning differs from that of children with typically developing speech. What this study adds to existing knowledge This study found that vocabulary was the strongest predictor of word learning across children with and without phonological impairment. There was no significant difference in word learning ability between children with and without phonological impairment. However, children with lexically precocious vocabulary abilities were significantly better at word learning than children with average vocabulary abilities. What are the potential or actual clinical implications of this work? Findings from this study support the importance of assessing and considering measures of word learning-including vocabulary-when working with children with phonological impairment. This study indicates that it is possible to use stories coupled with measures of confrontation naming and story retell to gain deeper insight into children's word learning abilities.