Arizona State University (ASU) SHS205 Exploring Communication Disorders in Children and Adults Final Practice Exam

The Mean Length of Utterance (MLU) is evaluated by measuring the average number of morphemes in a child’s speech. This assessment is crucial in understanding the complexity of a child's language use, as morphemes are the smallest units of meaning in a language. They can be whole words, prefixes, or suffixes. By analyzing a sample of the child's speech and counting the total number of morphemes, researchers can determine the MLU, which provides insights into the child's language development and grammatical skills. A higher MLU typically indicates more advanced language abilities, as it reflects a greater use of complex sentence structures and language variety.