A significant multivariate difference was found between the oral language performance of 44 children labeled reading disabled in the second, fourth, and sixth grades and 59 children of comparable grades who were attending regular classrooms and were free from reading disorders. The possible effects of sex, grade level, ethnicity, nonverbal problem-solving ability, and socioeconomic status were considered. Sex was a significant factor. Females scored higher on morphological and grammatical/syntactical measures. Male subjects used more different words than did females. The difference in language development was examined by (a) an analysis of the ability to spontaneously use grammatical and syntactical rules of the English language; (b) a comparison of the total number of words used compared with the number of different words; (c) an analysis of the relative proportion of use of various parts of speech; (d) an analysis of the average length of utterances; and (e) the number of verbal prompts necessary to evoke an oral response.
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