Audra Sterling, PhD – Slide of the Week
Title: The relationship between Working Memory and Grammatical Judgement in individuals with DS and FXS.
Legend: We examined how working memory relates to grammatical judgment skills in youth with Down syndrome (DS) and fragile X syndrome (FXS). We found that working memory significantly predicted greater accuracy on the grammatical judgment task (B = 0.12, SE = 0.06, z = 2.11, p = 0.035). Next, we ran exploratory analyses to examine if this relationship differed across diagnostic groups and the grammaticality of items in the grammatical judgement task. Panel A: We found a significant interaction between diagnosis and working memory (B = 0.28, SE = 0.11, z = 2.60, p = 0.009). Working memory supported better grammatical judgment performance for youth with FXS but not for those with DS. Panel B: We found a significant three-way interaction between grammaticality, working memory, and diagnosis (B = 1.42, SE = 0.18, z = 7.83, p < 0.00). In DS, at low working memory scores, accuracy was higher for ungrammatical than grammatical items, whereas at high scores, accuracy increased for grammatical items and decreased for ungrammatical items. In FXS, accuracy was higher for grammatical than ungrammatical items at low working memory scores. At high scores, ungrammatical accuracy increased substantially, while grammatical accuracy remained stable.
Citation: Sterling A., Elmquist M., Banasik A. et al. The relationship between language and executive functions in adolescents with Down syndrome and fragile X syndrome. J Neurodevelop Disord (2026). https://doi.org/10.1186/s11689-026-09697-x
Abstract: Individuals with fragile X syndrome (FXS) and Down syndrome (DS) have significant and pervasive challenges in language (and more specifically grammar) and executive functions (EFs). While these aspects of development are linked in autism and developmental language disorder, there has not been an investigation into this in FXS and DS. Thus, the purpose of this study was: 1) to evaluate the feasibility of experimental tasks for language and EFs, 2) to test if there are differences in language and EFs in DS and FXS, and 3) to test if EFs are related to grammatical abilities in DS and FXS within and between groups.
Investigator: Audra Sterling, PhD
About the Lab: The Research in Developmental Disabilities Language Lab examines the contributions of both biology and environment in the development of language and cognition in children with developmental disabilities.