Developmental Language Disorder at Adolescence: Links Between Communication Skills and Self-Efficacy Ratings

Anabel Buteau-Poulin, Nancy Gaudreau and Chantal Desmarais ()
Additional contact information
Anabel Buteau-Poulin: School of Rehabilitation Sciences, Université Laval, 2325 Rue de l’Université, Québec, QC G1V 0A6, Canada
Nancy Gaudreau: Faculty of Education, Université Laval, Québec, QC G1V 0A6, Canada
Chantal Desmarais: School of Rehabilitation Sciences, Université Laval, 2325 Rue de l’Université, Québec, QC G1V 0A6, Canada

Disabilities, 2025, vol. 5, issue 1, 1-13

Abstract: Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) has a prevalence of 7%, making it one of the important yet little known neurodevelopmental disorders. Often identified in kindergarten, children with DLD have language learning difficulties severe enough to impact their schooling and socialization. During adolescence, there is a high risk of academic, vocational, and mental health difficulties. However, for adults with DLD, a positive perception of self-efficacy may act as a protective factor. This led us to explore how communications skills and self-efficacy are related in adolescents with DLD. The participants were 49 teenagers, aged 12 to 15, who have DLD. Communication was measured using the Children’s Communication Checklist, completed by the teenagers’ parents, while perception of self-efficacy was reported by the teenagers as well as by their parents using the Generalized Self-Efficacy Scale. A significant correlation was found between communication and self-efficacy with three domains of communication being the most important in this association, i.e., coherence ( r = 0.716, p < 0.001), initiation ( r = 0.581, p < 0.001), and use of context ( r = 0.649, p < 0.001). These results highlight the crucial role of social communication in the profile of teenagers living with DLD. They further suggest that it may be relevant to examine whether supporting language development may foster positive perception of self-efficacy in teenagers living with DLD.

Keywords: developmental language disorder; teenagers; communication skills; self-efficacy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2673-7272/5/1/30/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2673-7272/5/1/30/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jdisab:v:5:y:2025:i:1:p:30-:d:1612827

Access Statistics for this article

Disabilities is currently edited by Ms. Cici Zhou

More articles in Disabilities from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().