PURPOSE: to obtain the profile of children with typical language development in expressive vocabulary test as well as to verify the types of semantic deviations such children used more frequently. METHODS: the study involved 400 normal children aging from three to six years. A lexical assessment protocol with 100 items was applied. A statistical study comparing age groups by means of nonparametric test was conducted for each age group. RESULTS: in relation to the number of items named, five and six-year-old children showed a performance similar and above the showed by three and four-year-old ones, and the numbers of items named increased at the same time that the age diminished. There was no significant statistical difference just between ages of five and six-year-old in relation to named and non-named items. The total number of semantic deviations in three-year-old children was superior to those submitted by four, five and six-year-old ones. Four-year-old children, on their turn, showed more semantic deviations than did five and six-year-old children. Higher-occurrence Deviations were belongs to super-extension and contiguity standards, and younger children showed a higher number of occurrences as compared to the older ones in both types of deviation. The occurrence of other kinds of deviation - morphologic and phonologic proximity, antonymy, deitic, periphasis and non-verbal designation - were insignificant. CONCLUSION: the higher the age, the higher the number of occurrences of expected vocabulary, and the lower the age, the higher the occurrence of non-named items. Among semantic deviations, the most frequent were super-extension and contiguity.
Language Tests; Language Development; Vocabulary
