Prime Time Replay:
Thomas Sowell
on "Late-talking" Children
MsgId: *brain_storm(1)
Date: Fri Aug 8 21:59:45 EDT 1997
From: Rob_Killheffer At: 205.198.117.80
Good evening, everyone, and welcome to another edition of Brainstorms. I'm your host, Rob Killheffer, and tonight we'll be discussing the topic of "late-talking" children. Our guest is Thomas Sowell, author of a new book on the subject. Welcome, Tom!
MsgId: *brain_storm(2)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:00:34 EDT 1997
From: Thomas_Sowell At: 168.100.204.58
Hi, here and ready to start.
MsgId: *brain_storm(3)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:03:38 EDT 1997
From: Rob_Killheffer At: 205.198.117.80
Well, then, away we go ... I confess that before reading your book I'd only heard fleetingly about the phenomenon of "late-talking" children, so for the benefit of others like me, perhaps we should start with a brief description of the concept: and you know from first-hand experience, since your own son was one of these late talkers, right?
MsgId: *brain_storm(4)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:05:01 EDT 1997
From: Thomas_Sowell At: 168.100.204.58
These are children who talked years later than the norm --not until three, four or five years old. Many children talk late for a wide variety of reasons. They may be mentally retarded, autistic, or have hearing problems. But some children suffer from none of these issues, and are even above average in intelligence -- and yet are years late in talking.
MsgId: *brain_storm(6)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:08:15 EDT 1997
From: Rob_Killheffer At: 205.198.117.80
From what you say in your book, in many cases these late talkers who don't suffer from some other dysfunction often exhibit unusually high aptitude in things like math and music. What's the connection?
MsgId: *brain_storm(7)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:09:25 EDT 1997
From: Thomas_Sowell At: 168.100.204.58
No one really knows, but there is a connection, that we know. More than half of the children have an engineer as a close relative, and four fifths have a close relative who plays a musical instruments. The children themselves tend to be very analytical and very musical. Among the famous people who have talked late were three nuclear physicists who worked together creating the first atomic bomb. These included Richard Feynman, Edward Teller, and Albert Einstein.
MsgId: *brain_storm(9)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:13:04 EDT 1997
From: Rob_Killheffer At: 205.198.117.80
With intellects like that in the bunch, there's no doubt that late talking isn't to be considered a defect, but on the other hand, in many of the cases you describe in your book, the late talkers seemed to exhibit some tendencies that resemble autism and other disorders -- at least to me, admittedly a non-expert. Things such as trouble with social skills, a tendency to get so absorbed in a task or in thoughts as to be oblivious to the outside worl. And the skills in mathematics and memory sometimes resemble the startling abilities of "idiot savants" and such, rapid calculation or eidetic memory. Could there be some relationship between late talking and these more extreme disorders?
MsgId: *brain_storm(11)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:16:30 EDT 1997
From: Thomas_Sowell At: 168.100.204.58
I'm not sure anyone knows the answer, but many of the things autistic children do are also done by normal people. The question is: How persistent is it, and how extreme? Among adult late talkers, many are articulate and not introverted. Examples would be Walter Williams and G. Gordon Liddy, neither of whom have been accused of being inarticulate or introverted.
MsgId: *brain_storm(12)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:19:59 EDT 1997
From: Rob_Killheffer At: 205.198.117.80
Absolutely, autistism seems to be much more persistent and extreme. One sort of "theme" that emerged in your book also made me think of autism, though -- how you felt that much of the misbehavior and poor social skills of late-talkers could be explained not by an "inability" to pay attention or obey, but an "unwillingness" to do so -- in the same way that Einstein was such a poor student because he was too bored in regular classes. I've heard people speculate that autism could be a kind of extreme dysfunction of the attention systems, which would make it a related condition.
MsgId: *brain_storm(13)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:21:37 EDT 1997
From: Thomas_Sowell At: 168.100.204.58
I am not an authority on autism -- my work is on late-talking children. I have done the first study ever on bright children who talk late. Many laymen have regarded some of these children as autistic, but medical professionals have shot down the idea.
MsgId: *brain_storm(15)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:24:43 EDT 1997
From: Rob_Killheffer At: 205.198.117.80
Sorry -- didn't mean to take you off topic. I've had some guests on over the past few months talking about the close relationship between the human language ability and the nature of human consciousness, and I wondered what you thought from observing late-talking children. My sense from your book is that you didn't notice any apparent difference in their mentality, even though they weren't talking. And, of course, they eventually go on to be very normal speakers, indistinguishable from others. Did you notice anything in general about the personalities of adult late-talkers that might reflect their experience in coming to speech later in their development, or do they lose all signs of it once they're older?
MsgId: *brain_storm(16)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:26:47 EDT 1997
From: Thomas_Sowell At: 168.100.204.58
There is no evidence that their speech as adults is different from the speech of other people. Nor is there any stereotyped personality type. Late talkers vary enormously.
MsgId: *brain_storm(17)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:32:22 EDT 1997
From: Rob_Killheffer At: 205.198.117.80
I've opened the room so that anyone in the audience who would like to ask a question may do so. Meanwhile, let's continue our conversation. You note that most -- though not all -- late talkers are male. Any idea why that might be so?
MsgId: *brain_storm(18)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:33:39 EDT 1997
From: Thomas_Sowell At: 168.100.204.58
Any answer to that would be in the realm of speculation. I have, however, discovered striking patterns among these children and their parents.
MsgId: *brain_storm(19)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:34:16 EDT 1997
From: Rob_Killheffer At: 205.198.117.80
What sorts of patterns?
MsgId: *brain_storm(20)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:36:19 EDT 1997
From: Thomas_Sowell At: 168.100.204.58
In addition to the highly analytical and musical families(including the children themselves), these people tend to have great memories and strong wills. They also tend to be late in toilet training.
MsgId: *brain_storm(21)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:39:55 EDT 1997
From: Rob_Killheffer At: 205.198.117.80
Yes, I noted the late toilet-training connection in your book. Odd. That's one of the factors that often gets these kids classified as retarded somehow. Have you got any sense of how common late-talking is?
MsgId: *brain_storm(22)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:41:33 EDT 1997
From: Thomas_Sowell At: 168.100.204.58
I am discovering that it is far more common than I would have believed just two years ago. Most adults who talked late have no memory of it. Many have learned that they talked late only after mentioning my study to their parents. Virtually everywhere I address large gatherings and mention these children, someone remembers an example of a child just like that. Many of these children have grown up to become engineers, mathematicians, musicians, and doctors.
MsgId: *brain_storm(24)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:43:54 EDT 1997
From: Rob_Killheffer At: 205.198.117.80
From your studies, does it seem that most or all late-talkers start speaking normally as a matter of course, just naturally, or do parents have to do something special to get their late-talking kids to develop the habit?
MsgId: *brain_storm(25)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:46:14 EDT 1997
From: Thomas_Sowell At: 168.100.204.58
Everything depends upon the individual child, and the individual medical diagnosis. Too many non-medical people are on a crusade for "early intervention," which may do more harm than good to particular children. There is a psychological harm: Many of these children resent it, and become angry and tense. Some programs teach sign language, which may sometimes retard normal speech development.Children may perceive that they are big dissapointments to their parents. One little girl who overheard her parents in despair over the fact that she was not talking spoke her first words" "I'm sorry."
MsgId: *brain_storm(27)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:50:26 EDT 1997
From: Rob_Killheffer At: 205.198.117.80
One of the things that emerged very clearly -- and chillingly -- from the stories of late-talkers in your book was how easy it is for the schools and other social systems to misunderstand these children and lump them into other categories. The parents in your book by and large managed to press on through the misdiagnoses and get the right thing for their kids. What advice would you give to a parent with a late-talker to help navigate the maze of experts who think they're in denial or something?
MsgId: *brain_storm(28)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:51:55 EDT 1997
From: Thomas_Sowell At: 168.100.204.58
My first advice would be to get two independent medical diagnoses, and ignore non-medical people. Schools, in particular, have a vested interest in labelling children abnormal so as to get more government money.
MsgId: *brain_storm(29)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:55:42 EDT 1997
From: Rob_Killheffer At: 205.198.117.80
You've surveyed the other research on late-talkers, and though you're not necessarily an expert on neural anatomy, perhaps you could let us know what some of the other research has shown. At least one of the stories you related mentioned unusual brainwave activity, for instance. Is that something that's been explored?
MsgId: *brain_storm(30)
Date: Fri Aug 8 22:57:21 EDT 1997
From: Thomas_Sowell At: 168.100.204.58
Nothing in my book deals with brain waves. It does deal with the fact that high IQ people, in general, do have certain anomalies to a much higher extent than the general public. It may well be that delayed speech is another one of those anomalies. Some of the other anomalies include higher incidences of allergies, childhood myopia, and left handedness.
MsgId: *brain_storm(32)
Date: Fri Aug 8 23:00:09 EDT 1997
From: Rob_Killheffer At: 205.198.117.80
Time's running short, so I'd like to thank you for appearing here on Brainstorms, Tom. Let me ask you a final question: Is there some way other interested people, people with late-talkers of their own, could get in touch with you or the group you communicate with to share info? And are you aware of any online resources that people who'd like more information could turn to?
MsgId: *brain_storm(33)
Date: Fri Aug 8 23:01:21 EDT 1997
From: Thomas_Sowell At: 168.100.204.58
Write to me at Hoover Institution, Stanford, CA 94305. Thanks, and goodnight.
MsgId: *brain_storm(34)
Date: Fri Aug 8 23:03:16 EDT 1997
From: Rob_Killheffer At: 205.198.117.80
Thanks again, Tom. For Brainstorms, this is Rob Killheffer, saying goodnight! And join me next week when my guest will be Robert Levine, a sociologist who has studied the different perceptions of time in different cultures. See you then!
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