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REVIEW article

Front. Pediatr.

Sec. Children and Health

Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fped.2025.1646686

This article is part of the Research TopicAdvancements and Challenges in Speech, Language, Swallowing, Orofacial and Hearing Disorders ResearchView all articles

When to Screen for Developmental Language Disorder: A Review of Age-Specific Evidence

Provisionally accepted
  • 1Brookdale University Hospital and Medical Center, New York, United States
  • 2College of Medicine, Yeungnam University, Gyeongsan, Republic of Korea

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

Developmental language disorder (DLD) is a heterogeneous condition with challenges in determining the optimal timing for screening. Despite the complexities of early language development, clinical decisions must still be made regarding when to identify children at risk. Recent literature has emphasized the need for the age-specific evaluation of screening precision. This review aims to identify the earliest age for acceptable predictive validity. A narrative synthesis of studies evaluating the validity of DLD screening tools or protocols was conducted, covering ages below 2 to 4 years. Screening before age 2 demonstrates insufficient sensitivity as a standalone screening point. By age 2.5, several tools achieve sensitivity and specificity above 70–80%, meeting recommended thresholds. At age 3, screening shows adequate concurrent validity. Screening at age 4 is more aligned with diagnosis than early detection. Based on existing evidence, 2.5 years is the earliest age at which DLD screening tools begin to demonstrate acceptable predictive performance. The findings may inform clinical guidelines on DLD screening and highlight the need for further age-stratified studies to refine DLD screening strategies.

Keywords: developmental language disorder, age, screening, diagnosis, prediction

Received: 13 Jun 2025; Accepted: 30 Sep 2025.

Copyright: © 2025 Park and Chang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence: Min Cheol Chang, wheel633@gmail.com

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