Poverty 
Children reared in poverty and children with clinically diagnosed language impairments score below average on standardized language tests, but low overlapping test scores do not mean that these two groups of children present the same types of language learning difficulties. In fact, most would argue that the nature of their deficits must differ because the source of their problems is not identical.
In some of our research, we are interested in learning more about the unique language learning needs of children reared in poverty. Research that reflects this work includes Pruitt & Oetting (2009; under review). In this work, we compared the past tense and past participle systems of 15 children reared in poverty to 30 middle-income controls. Results showed that the children reared in poverty present a different grammar profile than children with specific language impairment. Some of these differences are listed below.
Children Reared In Poverty
- Age-appropriate past tense marking
- Low rates of past participle marking
- Past participle < past tense
- High rates of over-regularizations
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Children with Language Impairment
- Low rates of past tense marking
- Low rates of past participle marking
- Past participle > past tense
- Absence of high rates of over-regularizations
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