C
CELF-5
Monica Barreto
Yale Child Study Center, New Haven, CT, USA
Synonyms
▶ CELF-5
a student’s unique needs, their functional language, and the language behaviors in both clinical
and educational settings (Wiig et al. 2013b).
Across settings, assessment begins with gathering
information regarding the presence of a language
disorder and/or a student’s language performance
at school and at home. The CELF-5 provides that
Observational Rating Scale (ORS), as a tool to
systematically document observations as a means
to provide descriptive information to help develop
plans for intervention.
Description
The Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals–Fifth Edition (CELF-5; Wiig et al. 2013a) is a
battery of tests designed to assess, diagnose, and
measure changes in oral and written language and
verbal and nonverbal communication in individuals 5–21 years of age. The CELF-5 can be used
to identify strengths and weaknesses in language,
determine service eligibility, provide intervention
strategies, and measure intervention efficacy. The
CELF-5 is individually administered by speechlanguage pathologists, school psychologists, special educators, and diagnosticians with training
and experience in administration and interpretation of individually administered standardization
language tests and knowledge of language structure rules.
The CELF-5 provides the flexibility of administering only the tests needed to answer referral
questions for assessment and evaluation. Thus,
the testing process can be individualized to meet
Diagnostic Battery
The CELF-5 provides a better balance of items
across receptive and expressive modalities, language content, and overall structure than its previous editions (Wiig et al. 2013b). It has been
developed and researched to enable examiners
the flexibility of using each group of items independently (e.g., Linguistic Concepts, Semantic
Relationships, and Understanding Spoken Paragraphs) of one another. The CELF-5 battery
includes revised tests from previous editions as
well as new tests used to evaluate word meaning
and vocabulary (semantics), word sentence structure (morphology and syntax), the rules of oral
language used in responding to and conveying
messages (pragmatics), the recall and retrieval of
spoken language (memory), and a new test used to
evaluate aspects of literacy (reading comprehension and written language production) (Wiig
et al. 2013a).
© Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2020
F. R. Volkmar (ed.), Encyclopedia of Autism Spectrum Disorders,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-6435-8_102333-1
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Administration
As a result of the flexibility in administration, the
average length of administration for the CELF-5
can vary across referral questions and age groups.
Administration of the Core Language tests takes
approximately 34 min for ages 5:0–8:11 and
42 min for ages 9:0–21:11. Administration of the
tests needed to derive the Receptive Language
Index takes an additional 16 min on average for
ages 5:0–8:11, and 9 min for ages 9:0–21:11. No
additional time is required to derive the Expressive Language Index for ages 5:0–8:11, as all
required tests for this index are part of the Core
Language Score. Additionally, in order to derive
the Expressive Language Index, an additional
12 min is needed for ages 9:0–21:11. Overall, in
order to administer the Core Language, Receptive
Language, and Expressive Language Indexes,
administration takes an average of 50 min for
ages 5:0–8:11 and 62 min for ages 9:0–21:11.
Once the CELF-5 assessment process is complete, clinicians must interpret the results, provide
extension testing to test the limits of the student’s
performance, and synthesize and report all assessment information (Wiig et al. 2013b).
Historical Background
The original CELF was published in 1980 by
Eleanor Messing Semel. Since its initial publication, the CELF has undergone four revisions. It
was originally developed to identify language disabilities, provide diagnostic information, and
identify relative strengths and weaknesses in
order to establish priorities for treatment and
follow-up intervention. The CELF-3, the second
revision to the CELF, was frequently used to
evaluate individuals who had suffered traumatic
brain injuries (TBI) (Semel et al. 1995; Paslawski
2005). In 2003, the CELF-4 (Semel et al. 2003)
was published. It was primarily used to screen for
and diagnose language disorders in children and
young adults aged 5–21. The norms of the
CELF-4 were updated based on a diverse standardization using a US sample of 2,650 individuals that reflected the 2000 US census. Of this
sample, 39% identified as minorities and 10%
CELF-5
reported having a disability (Wiig et al. 2013b).
The CELF-4 was designed as a tool for the clinical
decision-making process, including making a
diagnosis, determining the severity of a language
disorder, identifying relative strengths and weaknesses, making recommendations regarding
accommodations and intervention, and measuring
the efficacy of intervention (Paslawski 2005).
Additionally, in 2004, the CELF-Preschool,
second edition was developed to (CELF
Preschool-2) assesses language ability in children
ages 3–6 (Wiig et al. 2004; Paslawski 2005).Similar to the CELF-4, the CELF Preschool-2 was
used to identify and diagnose language deficits
in children and for the purposes of follow-up.
The CELF Preschool-2 has four levels of assessment with respect to language disorders, including
identification of a language disorder, description
of the disorder, assessing the effect of the disorder
on classroom functioning, and pragmatics. The
CELF Preschool-2 also overlaps with the
CELF-4 for children ages 5 and 6.
Psychometric Data
Standardization for the CELF-5 occurred in 2012,
using a sample of 3,250 English-speaking individuals in the USA between the ages of 5 and 21.
Participants were gathered from 47 states (Wiig
et al. 2013) and were stratified according to age,
race/ethnicity (White, Hispanic, African American, Asian, and Other), geographical region
(West, Midwest, Northeast, and South), and parent/caregiver education level (less than a high
school diploma, high school diploma, some college or technical school, and 4 or more years of
college) (Wiig et al. 2013a). Five percent of participants reported having an attention disorder;
1% a learning disability, intellectual disability,
pervasive developmental disorder, Down syndrome, or developmental delay; and less than
1% reported having an emotional disturbance,
cerebral palsy, color blindness, central auditory
processing disorder, visual impairment, autism,
or other diagnoses. Approximately 7% were diagnosed with a speech and/or language disorder, 4%
with articulation or phonological disorder, and
CELF-5
<1% with fluency/voice disorder (Wiig
et al. 2013a).
Internal consistency of the CELF-5 was measured using the split-half method with the
Spearman–Brown correction formula (Wiig et al.
2013). The average subtest reliability coefficients
ranged from acceptable (0.77) to excellent (0.99)
for ages 5:0–8:11, while the reliability coefficients
for the indexes were excellent and ranged from
0.93 to 0.97. For individuals between the ages of
9:0–21:11, the average subtest reliability coefficients were acceptable (0.60) to excellent (0.99),
while the reliability coefficients for the indexes
were excellent and ranged from 0.92 to 0.97.
Internal consistency was also calculated for individuals from three special populations: language
disorders, autism spectrum disorder, and reading
and/or writing learning disability (Wiig et al.
2013a). Coefficients for these groups ranged
from acceptable (0.75) to excellent (0.99) for the
subtests. Index coefficients were not reported
(Wiig et al. 2013a).
Test–retest stability was obtained via Pearson’s
product–moment correlation by administering the
CELF-5 twice within a 7–46-day interval to
137 participants (Wiig et al. 2013a). Participants
were grouped in three age groups (5:0–6:11,
8:0–9:11, and 12:0–16:11). Results for the
5:0–6:11 age group indicated acceptable (0.68)
to excellent (0.92) subtest stability and good
(0.84–0.89) composite stability (Wiig et al.
2013a). Similarly, results for the 8:0–9:11 age
group indicated adequate (0.77) to good (0.89)
subtest stability and good (0.87) to excellent
(0.92) composite stability. Lastly, results for the
12:0–16:11 age group indicated poor (0.56) to
excellent (0.93) subtest stability and good (0.86)
to excellent (0.91) composite stability (Wiig
et al. 2013a).
The majority of subtests on the CELF-5 are
objectively scored (i.e., correct or incorrect),
thus they were not analyzed for interrater reliability. However, the following subtests require qualitative judgment for scoring of responses: Word
Structure, Formulated Sentences, Word Definitions, and Structured Writing. Overall interrater
reliability for these subtests was excellent and
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ranged from 0.91 (Formulated Sentences) to
0.99 (Word Structure) (Wiig et al. 2013a).
Furthermore, good to strong interrelationships
among all subtests and composites support the
validity of the CELF-5. Intercorrelations ranged
from 0.19 to 0.65 for subtests and from 0.72 to
0.97 for composites. Additionally, the relationship
among scores on the CELF-5 and other measures
of language development informed the measure’s
concurrent validity (Wiig et al. 2013a). Correlations between CELF-5 and CELF-4 subtests were
adequate (0.64) to good (0.88), whereas correlations between the indexes were good (0.82) to
excellent (0.92). Additional comparisons were
made with the Peabody Picture Vocabulary
Test–Fourth Edition (PPVT-4; Dunn and Dunn
2007) and the Expressive Vocabulary
Test–Second Edition (EVT-2; Williams 2007).
The PPVT-4 indicated adequate (0.75) to excellent (0.95) correlations with CELF-5 subtests and
adequate (0.68) to good (0.80) correlations with
CELF-5 indexes. Similarly, comparisons with the
EVT-2 indicated adequate (0.71) to excellent
(0.98) correlations with CELF-5 subtests and adequate (0.65–0.78) correlations with CELF-5
indexes (Wiig et al. 2013a).
Clinical Uses
The CELF-5 is a comprehensive assessment that
is sensitive to cultural and linguistic diversity and
addresses components within the World Health
Organization’s International Classification of
Functioning, Disability, and Health (2001) (Wiig
et al. 2013b). This assessment tool has been developed to aide in the identification of reading and
writing difficulties as well as to determine problems with spoken language and the possible
impact it may have on a student’s written language. Therefore, the CELF-5 assists clinicians
in evaluating a student’s strengths and weaknesses, communicating a student’s needs,
addressing parent and teacher concerns, better
identifying deficits in social language skills, and
identifying the need for an Individualized Education Program (IEP) (Wiig et al. 2013b).
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Overall, the CELF-5 allows clinicians to evaluate a student’s general language ability and
obtain information that aids in determining if a
student has a language disorder by administering
four to six tests. Once a language disorder has
been determined, the assessment process can be
extended in order to further investigate areas of
strength and weaknesses. Clinicians are able to
determine whether significant differences exist
between comprehension and expression, identify
weaknesses in the areas of morphology and syntax or semantics, identify how the oral language
disorder might affect a student’s written language
skills, and examine if the identified language disorder affects the student’s social language
interactions.
See Also
▶ Expressive Vocabulary Test–Second Edition
(EVT-2)
▶ Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test–Fourth Edition (PPVT-4)
CELF-5
References and Readings
Dunn, L. M., & Dunn, D. M. (2007). Peabody picture
vocabulary test (4th ed.). Bloomington: NCS Pearson.
Paslawski, T. (2005). The clinical evaluation of language
fundamentals, fourth edition (CELF-4). Canadian
Journal of School Psychology, 20(1–2), 129–134.
https://doi.org/10.1177/0829573506295465.
Semel, E., Wiig, E., & Secord, W. (1987). Clinical evaluation of language fundamentals (Rev. ed.). San
Antonio: The Psychological Corp.
Semel, E., Wiig, E., & Secord, W. A. (1995). Clinical
evaluation of language fundamentals (3rd ed.). San
Antonio: The Psychological Corp.
Semel, E., Wiig, E. H., & Secord, W. A. (2003). Clinical
evaluation of language fundamentals–fourth edition
(CELF-4). San Antonio: NCS Pearson.
Turkstra, L. S. (1999). Language testing in adolescents
with brain injury. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 30(2), 132–140. https://doi.org/
10.1044/0161-1461.3002.132.
Wiig, E. H., Secord, W. A., & Semel, E. (2004). Clinical
evaluation of language fundamentals – Preschool, second edition (CELF Preschool-2). Toronto: The Psychological Corporation/A Harcourt Assessment Company.
Wiig, E. H., Semel, E., & Secord, W. A. (2013a). Clinical
evaluation of language fundamentals–fifth edition
(CELF-5). Journal of Psychoeducational Assessment,
33(5), 495–500.
Wiig, E. H., Semel, E., & Secord, W. A. (2013b). Clinical
evaluation of language fundamentals–fifth edition
(CELF-5). Bloomington: NCS Pearson.
Williams, K. T. (2007). Expressive vocabulary test
(2nd ed.). Minneapolis: NCS Pearson.