The ability to talk about the @entity3538 ( @entity3538 ) of self and other is an age-typical development of early childhood that is thought to reflect young @entity1 's emergent self-other understanding. This study examined the emergence of an @entity3538 lexicon in a cross-sectional sample of young @entity1 with Down syndrome (DS) and a cognitively and demographically comparable group of @entity245 ( @entity245 ) @entity1 . @entity1 's @entity3538 lexicons were derived from transcripts of their spontaneous utterances during two laboratory contexts: a mother- @entity1 emotions picture book task and semistructured play. @entity1 with DS produced significantly fewer @entity3538 words and fewer @entity3538 word types than their MA-matched counterparts. Controlling for corpus size, @entity1 with DS also were less likely to attribute @entity3538 to themselves and were more context bound in their use of @entity3538 language. In addition, @entity1 with DS also differed from @entity245 @entity1 in the semantic content of their @entity3538 language, with proportionately higher rates of affective words and lower rates for words about volition ability, and cognition. For both the DS and @entity245 groups, individual differences in @entity3538 language production were significantly related to general expressive language skills. However, dissociations were observed for the relation between @entity1 's @entity3538 word production and nonverbal symbolic play skills in the two groups. These findings suggest some degree of disorganization at the interface among symbolic domains for @entity1 with DS. Because @entity3538 language is critical to the regulation of social interaction and an early index of self-other differentiation and understanding, @entity1 with DS may be at risk for later compromises in self-organization.

Talking about self and other: emergence of an internal state lexicon in young XXXX with Down syndrome.

@entity1 :: ('9606', 'Species') :: ['children', 'Children', 'child'] @entity3538 :: ('MESH:D002341', 'Disease') :: ['internal states', 'IS'] @entity245 :: ('MESH:D002658', 'Disease') :: ['ND', 'normally developing']
@entity1 :: (9606,Species) :: ['children']
