Validation of the Parent Report Language Use Inventory to Portuguese

Abstract

Language acquisition and development takes in account the child's interaction with the
surrounding environment. Daily social interactions with people and communication
with others allow the child to acquire language being pragmatics considered a system of
rules that support the communicative use of language. Identification and assessment of
children at risk for language disorders are crucial in order to carry out an effective early
intervention. This study was carried out taking into account first, the relevance of
pragmatics as a component of language, and second the lack of assessment tools in
Portugal to assess these abilities. Therefore, the aim of this study consists on the
translation, adaptation and validation of the inventory “Language Use Inventory” (LUI),
to European Portuguese. The LUI is a standardized parent report measure designed to
assess pragmatic language development in children within 18- to 47-month-old. All
procedures recommended by test adaptation guidelines were adopted in this study. A
pilot study was carried out with a sample of 120 inventories, answered by the
parents/caregivers of the Portuguese children in the target age groups. Cronbach's alpha,
which is a numerical coefficient of reliability obtained for the scale strongly confirm a
very good internal consistency for the LUI-Pt with 0.97 for the total scale, and
coefficients between 0, 71 - 0, 96 for the sub-scales. Preliminary results indicate the
internal validity of the LUI-Pt for Portuguese children confirming its clinical usefulness
as an assessment tool.