ABSTRACT
T o date, behavioral research has been our primary means of learning about child-hood language disorders. As part of this approach, researchers have assembleddetailed profiles of the speech and language behaviors exhibited by children with specific language impairment, autism-spectrum disorder, dyslexia, and other language disorders. Although certainly useful, this approach has provided limited insight into the causes of such disorders. This is because language performance is inherently rooted in cognition, and descriptions of behavior do not fully capture the cognitive processing activities that drive language performance. Researchers are now beginning to turn to neurobiological science, a method with good construct validity for uncovering these processes. The aim of this chapter is to provide an overview of some of the more relevant neurobiological methods that are currently in use.
