What Causes Developmental Delays In Speech And Language

Hearing your child communicate for the first time can be one of the most heartwarming moments for parents and caregivers.

When you hear these sounds, it can be a sign that your child has reached a key speech and language milestone.

However, if your child isn’t meeting these milestones, this may cause you some anxiety as a parent.

This is because not meeting these speech and/or language developmental milestones may be a sign of a speech and language delay.

These developmental delays may occur due to a genetic or developmental condition or some other cause.

If you’re noticing that your child isn’t meeting their speech and language developmental milestones, at The Voz Institute we can provide speech and language therapy to support them in their communication development.

Let’s delve further into the causes of speech and language delays and how a speech therapist can help.

What Are Speech And Language Developmental Delays?

As your child develops, so do their speech and language skills.

At each stage during their developmental journey, there are some significant speech and language milestones that they should be reaching based on their age.

These speech and language milestones include:

• Making cooing sounds by 3 months
• Looking toward the source of a sound using their eyes by 6 months
• Babbling by 9 months
• Understanding and saying simple words like “no” and “yes” by 12 months
• Making gestures by 12 months
• Saying their first word by 15 months
• Recognizing and saying up to 10 words, such as people’s names, the words for objects, and body parts by 18 months
• Using non-verbal means to answer a question by 18 months

By 24 months, your child should be able to put words together into phrases, and you should be able to understand them.

And by 5 years of age, your child should be able to understand more complex questions.

When your child is not meeting these developmental stages, there are different types of speech and language delays that they may experience.

They may experience receptive language delays where they experience challenges with understanding others speech.

In addition, expressing themselves through language may be a challenge, which could indicate receptive language delays.

Or they may experience mixed language delays, which include a combination of these two.

Causes Of Speech And Language Developmental Delays

If your child is experiencing a delay, we usually don’t know why.

When we don’t know the cause of the delay, it is referred to as an idiopathic developmental delay.

But when we do know the cause, it is usually one of the factors below.

1. Autism

Autism is a neurodevelopmental condition and neurodivergent condition.

Individuals with this condition will experience differences in their brain structure and function.

These differences will impact the way you navigate the world around you.

In some cases, this may include differences in speech, communication, and language.

Since autism is a spectrum, some children will reach their speech and language developmental milestones just fine.

Whereas other children may face challenges with developing their speech and language skills.

Some signs of speech and language challenges in autistic children include:

• Not making eye contact during speech
• Using few or no gestures during communication
• Trying to express their needs with frustration when doing so
• Being non-speaking or using few words
• Having little or no response to someone calling their name

Fortunately, if your child is experiencing these challenges, The Voz Institute can provide autism speech therapy to support them.

2. Hearing Loss

Hearing impairments involve hearing loss that interferes with your ability to hear.

We spoke a bit about how hearing impairments can lead to speech and language delays in our article – How Does Hearing Impairment Affect Development For Children?.

But here is a summary regarding this relationship.

Babies born with hearing loss may have a difficult time learning new words that are used to form speech because they can’t hear the words correctly.

As a result, babies with hearing loss may experience speech developmental delays.

These challenges may occur due to ear infections, inner ear damage, ruptured eardrums, or differences in bone growth.

The signs of this hearing loss depend on the age of your child.

When your child is a baby or toddler, they may:

• Not make babbling noises
• Not say anything other than babbling sounds
• Not react when someone makes a loud sound or speaks loudly

As your child develops into the school-age years, they may also experience difficulty in school.

This may show up as slipping grades, exhaustion after school, and frustration in school settings.

They may have a difficult time:

• Following simple directions
• Knowing where sounds are coming from
• Understanding what someone is saying unless they are communicating face to face with the person

If your child is experiencing these speech language delays because of hearing loss, consider speech therapy for hearing-impaired kids.

3. Down Syndrome

Usually when a baby is born, they have two copies of each chromosome, or 23 pairs of chromosomes.

Down syndrome is a genetic condition where someone is born with an extra copy or third copy of chromosome 21.

When this happens, it causes differences in speech and language development.

As a result of a larger tongue, your child may have a difficult time forming particular sounds.

They may also experience a variety of other challenges, including:

• Ear infections that impact hearing
• Motor speech disorders
• Learning disabilities like dyslexia

If your child has Down syndrome, speech therapy may be of benefit to them.

To discover more about this form of treatment, consider reading – What Is Down Syndrome And How Can Speech Therapy Help?

4. Learning Disabilities

Learning disabilities occur when your child may be struggling with reading, writing, or spelling.

They may have a difficult time learning:

• New words
• Left and right
• The alphabet
• New directions
• How to count
• The words to songs
• Basic math
• How to use an analog clock

They may also have a difficult time talking about new ideas or understanding questions and remembering what they heard.

In particular, dyslexia is a written language disorder where your child has a difficult time with reading comprehension and written expression.

As a result, they may miss speech and developmental milestones.

Commonly, they may write letters backward.

In addition, before your child begins school, they may show the following signs:

• Mixing up sounds
• Not being able to pronounce longer words or having trouble doing so
• Trouble with understanding rhymes or learning the alphabet
• Trouble with learning how to count or do basic math
• Trouble using an analog clock

During the school-age period, they may have additional symptoms, including:

• Spelling errors
• Writing in a messy manner
• Reading and writing at a pace that is slower than their developmental age
• Errors with pronouncing words when reading out loud
• Difficulty learning the names of letters and the days of the week
• Feeling like the letters or numbers on a page are moving

In addition to dyslexia, your child may also experience dysgraphia, which involves an impairment in writing.

This can also make it difficult to learn how to read and write.

If your child has one or more of these learning disabilities, consider speech therapy for learning disabilities.

5. Other Potential Causes And Risk Factors

If your child is experiencing speech and language delays and it isn’t one of the reasons above, there are other potential causes.

These include genetic conditions like fragile X syndrome or Martin-Bell syndrome.

This can involve difficulty with both expressive and receptive language.

In addition, your child may be more at risk of experiencing speech and language delays if they experience one or more of these risk factors:

• They are male
• They were born prematurely
• They were born with a low birth weight
• Developmental delays run in your family history
• They have limited access to education
• They experience frequent ear infections

What To Do If Your Child Has A Speech Or Language Developmental Delay

As a parent, it is natural to be concerned with whether your child is meeting their developmental milestones.

If your child is showing signs of not meeting their core speech and language milestones, your first step would be to see a speech therapist.

The speech therapist will perform an assessment of your child’s language and speech skills.

This assessment will usually involve a conversation with you and any other caregiver for the child.

Based on your child’s age, the cause of the delays, and their medical history, they will develop a treatment plan.

This plan will be tailored to your child’s specific strengths and will address their weak spots in speech and language.

The speech therapy will support your child in meeting their speech and language milestones.

It may also address any underlying causes of their developmental delays that are impacting their speech or language.

Book Your Appointment With The Voz Institute Today

Is your child experiencing some of the signs of a speech or language delay?

Or do they have one of the risk factors or causes for delays in speech and language?

Early intervention is key when it comes to supporting your child’s speech and language development.

If your child isn’t meeting their communication milestones, there may be an underlying cause that speech therapy can help address.

At The Voz Institute, we offer personalized assessments and therapy plans designed to help your child thrive.

No matter the cause—whether it’s autism, hearing loss, Down syndrome, or another factor—our speech therapy team is here to support your child’s journey.

Book your appointment with The Voz Institute today and take the first step toward helping your child reach their full communication potential.