Performance of Brazilian Portuguese speakers in the Test of Narrative Language (TNL)

摘要

Purpose Investigate the performance of native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese in the Test of Narrative Language (TNL) and correlate their performance in its oral narration and narrative comprehension subtests. Methods Participants were 140 individuals with typical language development aged 5-0 to 11-11 (years-months) divided according to age group. Results Statistically significant difference was observed between the 5-year-old group and all the other age groups and between the 6-year-old group and the 8-, 9-, 10- and 11-year-old groups. The 7-year-old group did not differ from the 6- and 8-year-old groups. Half of the 7-year-old group was in 1 st grade of Elementary School and the other half was in 2 nd grade, which may have contributed to the non-differentiation between this group and its border-age groups. No statistically significant difference was found between groups as of the age of eight years. Positive correlation was observed between performance in the narrative comprehension and oral narration subtests of the TNL in the 5-, 6- and 7-year-old groups, which did not occur for the other age groups. Conclusion The Test of Narrative Language differentiated the 5-, 6- and 7-year-old groups, but did not differentiate groups as of the age of eight years. No correlation was found between performance in the oral narration and narrative comprehension subtests of the TNL as of the age of eight years, which suggests mastery of both skills from this age.