Language delay link to testosterone

[Posted: Thu 26/01/2012 by Deborah Condon www.irishhealth.com]

When it comes to language development in children, boys tend to be behind girls, developing words at a slower rate and at a later age. Now, a new study has found that this may be partly due to a boy's exosure to testosterone while still in the womb.

According to Australian researchers, 'an estimated 12% of toddlers experience significant delays in their language development'. Suspecting that this may be due to exposure to sex hormones in the womb, the team decided to study this further.

It is already known that male foetuses have 10 times more circulating levels of testosterone than female foetuses, so the researchers worked under the premise that exposure to higher levels of testosterone while still in the womb may contribute to language delays.

They measured the testosterone levels present in the unbilical cords of almost 800 newborns. The children's language skills were then assessed at the ages of one, two and three years of age.

The study found that males babies who had high levels of testosterone in the blood of their umbilical cords were up to three times more likely to experience a delay in their language development.

However, the opposite was true for female babies. High exposure to testosterone among them appeared to decrease the risk of language delay.

"Language delay is one of the most common reasons children are taken to a paediatrician. Now these findings can help us to understand the biological mechanisms that may underpin language delay, as well as language development more generally," the team from the University of Western Australia said.

Details of these findings are published in the the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry.

<!---->