Notice of Special Interest (NOSI): Tackling Acquisition of Language in Kids (TALK) R01
Deadline: September 25, 2024
5 pm
Amount: Variable
Purpose
Purpose
The purpose of this Notice of Special Interest (NOSI) is to encourage applications for R01 research projects to: (1) advance our understanding of why children with various conditions and/or risk factors are late to talk, (2) differentiate developmental trajectories that lead to better outcomes, and (3) evaluate the effectiveness of clinical approaches to improve outcomes. The ultimate goal is to provide parents, caregivers, and professionals with the information they need to help late talking children grow and thrive.
Background
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) Tackling Acquisition of Language in Kids (TALK) initiative seeks to support activities to better understand early language learning and delay. Late talking, also known as late language emergence, is diagnosed when a child, usually over the age of 18 months, is not meeting expressive language milestones. Approximately 10% to 20% of children receive this diagnosis. Children may be at higher risk for late talking for a variety of reasons including, but not limited to, premature birth, exposure to maltreatment or trauma, and intellectual and developmental disorders; and yet other children present as late talkers for no other known reason and with no other symptoms. Outcomes for late talking children are variable and the unique predictors and developmental sequelae are yet unknown. Understanding developmental trajectories and effectively supporting positive outcomes is even more complex in culturally and linguistically diverse children. Further research is needed to enhance our understanding of the full range of language development from infancy through childhood and adolescence across the diverse array of children who exhibit signs of late talking. There is a critical need to build a more robust knowledge base for this unique population to better inform parents, caregivers, professionals, and other partners regarding the nature, extent, and longitudinal, developmental course of late talking children. It also is critically important to develop new and more effective ways of evaluating and supporting communication success across this broad and diverse array of children.
Research Objectives
This NOSI encourages applications that address the objectives of: (1) acquiring and analyzing the data necessary to understand longitudinal development in late talking children; (2) developing, evaluating, disseminating, and implementing state-of-the-science information and evidence-based practices to effectively guide parents, caregivers, and professionals in supporting the success of late talking children; (3) creating, adapting, or applying novel approaches to the study of late talkers to develop new and more effective ways of understanding and supporting late talking children in research and practice settings.
This NOSI encourages applications that address the objectives of TALK, including but not limited to studies that:
- Evaluate scalable methods for accurately screening for late talking in the general population that includes children from various cultural and linguistic groups
- Compare different methods of identifying late talking
- Identify optimal measures for differentiating developmental trajectories in late talking children across a variety of conditions/risk factors and in various cultural and linguistic groups
- Identify outcome measures for late talking that are meaningful to invested parties (e.g., caregivers, professionals)
- Develop and evaluate interventions (e.g., programs, products, policies) to improve outcomes for late talking children
- Adapt and test novel or emerging approaches to more accurately identify late talkers and/or more accurately discern developmental trajectories associated with different outcomes
- Translate promising approaches from research studies into clinical tools that can be used in real world settings
More Info: https://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-DC-24-010.html